Karun Nair will be back in Karnataka colours next season after receiving an official no-objection certificate from Vidarbha on Monday evening. The top-order batter left Bengaluru three summers ago, enjoyed two productive years in Nagpur, and is now keen to “go home”, as one coach put it.
“I’d like to thank VCA for everything they’ve done for me in the last two years… Grateful to the VCA, and all the players and support staff,” Nair said. “The opportunity to lead such an amazing bunch during the Vijay Hazare and achieving success in the Ranji Trophy is something I’ll look back on very fondly.”
Key facts first. Nair, 33, played a central role in Vidarbha’s third Ranji Trophy title earlier this year, scoring 863 runs at 53.93, four of them hundreds, including a decisive ton in the final against Kerala. Those runs pushed him back into India’s Test squad after an eight-year gap. His white-ball form was just as sharp: 779 runs in eight Vijay Hazare Trophy innings, five straight hundreds, strike-rate 124.01, and a quirky List-A record of 542 runs without being dismissed.
The England tour has been quieter. A double-hundred for India A promised much, but his six Test knock so far read 0, 20, 31, 26, 40 and 14, mostly at number three. No panic, yet no big statement either.
Back home, Karnataka’s batting looks crowded. Mayank Agarwal is still captain, Devdutt Padikkal is inked in, while youngsters R Smaran, KL Shrijith and KV Aneesh all made first-class centuries last winter. Smaran topped the state charts with 516 runs. Slotting Nair into that group will test the selectors’ stated aim of “planning for the future” – an approach that hastened the exits of K Gowtham and Manish Pandey last year.
There is movement on the bowling front too. Seamer V Koushik, Karnataka’s leading wicket-taker in 2024-25 with 23 wickets in seven matches, has secured an NOC to join Goa. The 32-year-old, a late starter who quit a corporate job in 2019, formed the backbone of the attack after R Vinay Kumar, Abhimanyu Mithun and S Aravind retired. His shift leaves Karnataka a little light on experienced pace options.
Coaches on the domestic circuit view Nair’s return as mutually beneficial. One Karnataka selector said quietly that the team “missed a senior middle-order presence” in tight fourth-innings chases, while Vidarbha officials insisted there was “no ill-will” over his departure. Both sides appear content.
From a broader lens, the move underlines an old truth about Indian domestic cricket: players roam, but home often tugs hardest. Nair began his career in Bengaluru, made a triple-hundred for India there, and still spends off-season weeks at the KSCA nets. Now, after proving a point elsewhere, he will try to do it all again where it started.
Whether the story has another international chapter depends on runs, not romance. For now, the plan is simple: land from England, take a short break, report to the Karnataka pre-season camp in late August. A familiar routine, yet a fresh challenge.
