Former Indian player Robin Uthappa has claimed that Kuldeep Yadav, the star spinner, has taken things for granted after having a purple patch in 2025. He has also noted that the excessive workload has affected his trajectory and hence his form, especially in white-ball cricket.
India lost their first-ever home ODI series to New Zealand, and several reasons were cited for the losses. Though mostly the management has been blamed for poor selections and Captain Gill has been blasted for making wrong strategies that backfired, the individual excellence of the players is equally responsible.
The former Indian wicket-keeper has pointed his gun towards spinner Kuldeep Yadav, who has been India’s main strike bowler in the last few series, but failed to deliver this time around. In three games, Kuldeep managed just 3 wickets at an economy of 7.28.
Robin Uthappa blames Kuldeep Yadav for taking things for granted
Former Indian wicket-keeper batter and Kuldeep Yadav’s former KKR teammate Robin Uthappa has commented on Team India’s star left-arm spinner for his poor show in the three-match home ODI series against New Zealand.
Uthappa pointed out that when players go through purple patches in their careers, they sometimes tend to take things for granted. He reckoned that a similar case would be with Kuldeep Yadav.
“One of the things that can often happen with athletes, you’re going through a good period, and not intentionally, but you sometimes just take things for granted. And by virtue of doing that, one thing goes amiss; it’s like that one little domino going amiss, and it’s all a cascading effect,” said Robin Uthappa in his YouTube video.
Lack of trajectory has turned Kuldeep’s bowling ineffective – Robin Uthappa
He also explained how excess workload could also affect spinners to a large extent, and the effect is not limited to pace bowlers because they have to steam in with the ball. He pointed out that the 31-year-old Indian cricketer has been playing way too many games for India recently.
“It could be that one thing that happened three months ago with Kuldeep. Because he started playing a lot more Test matches, maybe because his body got tired, he started delivering that ball, which stopped getting taller,” Uthappa pointed out.
Kuldeep’s biggest struggle in the series has been against New Zealand batter Daryl Mitchell, who was in a dream touch in the series. Finishing with 350+ runs, he scored several of his runs against the Chinaman bowler.
Uthappa also observed that even if Kuldeep was bowling his best delivery to the batter, it turned out to be ineffective due to the low trajectory. The ball needs to have a significant dip for any spinner to get wickets, but in Mitchell’s case, he was getting nicely under the ball.
“If he doesn’t have that extra six inches of depth in that dip, that could be the difference between deceiving him and beating him outside the off stump to a six down the ground. That could impact his confidence, and that could impact Kuldeep operating from a defensive state rather than an aggressive state,” Uthappa further added.
“His mindset is his biggest advantage,” said Robin Uthappa
Uthappa felt Kuldeep Yadav is the most effective when he has an aggressive mindset, as that is his biggest strength, but batters like Mitchell can force him to be defensive, which then disorients the crafty spinner.
“Kuldeep is the kind of bowler who can be pushed into that mentality where he becomes defensive. And the minute you push him into that mentality, he takes away every advantage that he possesses as a bowler. His mindset is his biggest advantage, according to me,” Uthappa added.
Kuldeep Yadav’s form will be key to India in the upcoming ICC T20 World Cup, though they still have Varun Chakravarthy and Axar Patel playing that format, who are also expert tricksters.
