Ishan Kishan stormed back to red-ball cricket in the domestic arena with a century for India C on the opening day of the second-round clash in the Duleep Trophy. A lot has happened with him this year on the cricketing front as a once first-choice wicketkeeper across formats in Rishabh Pant's absence, lost his place from all formats within a few months.
Ishan made his Test debut last year on the West Indies tour and was also part of India's ODI World Cup squad. He was always an automatic selection in T20Is as well but then he returned home midway through the South Africa tour for personal reasons late last year and this is when things started going wrong for him. It is still not clear whether it was a communication problem between him and the selectors but Kishan not playing domestic cricket ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL) didn't go down well with many.
Ishan Kishan for India in Tests, ODIs and T20Is
| Format | Matches | Innings | Runs | Average | 50s/100s |
| Tests | 2 | 3 | 78 | 78 | 1/0 |
| ODIs | 27 | 24 | 933 | 42.4 | 1/7 |
| T20Is | 32 | 32 | 796 | 25.67 | 0/6 |
It adversely affected his career as the left-handed batter was replaced by KS Bharat on the South Africa tour for Tests and soon lost his central contract as well. He hasn't played a single game for India this year across formats and the man will have to be consistent enough in domestic cricket to stake his claim for a place again.
Ishan lost his place in the Indian team due to off-field reasons and when Rishabh Pant was unavailable due to a serious accident. But now the latter has returned and is obviously the first-choice wicketkeeper-batter in Tests and also not in white-ball cricket. But Pant's returns in white-ball cricket, especially in T20Is, haven't been great so far and he is only making a comeback to Tests.
Rishabh Pant for India in Tests, ODIs and T20Is
| Format | Matches | Innings | Runs | Average | 50s/100s |
| Tests | 33 | 56 | 2271 | 43.67 | 11/5 |
| ODIs | 31 | 27 | 871 | 33.5 | 5/1 |
| T20Is | 76 | 66 | 1209 | 23.25 | 3/0 |
So, if Kishan starts performing consistently, there is every chance of performance pressure on Pant and that can bring the best out of both players. Having said that, it could be too early to say as Ishan has played only one big knock and will have to be on his toes to have any chance of making a comeback in any of the formats in the near future.
