Bengaluru: Dashing Indian batsman Robin Uthappa has bid farewell to his parent association KSCA which groomed him from his entry at the age of 17 and would be playing for Kerala from next season.
The 31-year-old from Kodagu who made his first-class debut for the State in 2002-03 season had been playing for Karnataka for the last 15 years.
According to sources, KSCA has granted No Objection Certificate to him as the efforts to retain him went in vain.
KSCA Hon.
Secretary Sudhakar Rao said “I had a long chat with Robin and he had his reasons for moving out.
We tried to hold him back but couldn’t, so we had to issue the NOC as per his request.
His contribution to Karnataka cricket is immense and we wish him the best always.
” During his stay, Robin, who replaced J Arun Kumar in the State team, had played important role in the team’s achievements in the tournaments especially in Ranji matches.
A dashing batsman, Robin has played in 101 first-class matches for Karnataka and has to his credit of amassing 6865 runs, which included 18 centuries and 33 half-centuries.
Besides he had proved himself as most dependable fielder and had taken 102 catches.
Uthappa went through a rough patch over the past couple of seasons.
In 2015-16 he shared the wicketkeeping duties with C M Gautam and the move did not work too well for him or the team.
Last season, where Karnataka crashed to the humiliating defeat to Tamil Nadu in the quarterfinals, he had a mediocre run, scoring 328 runs in seven innings including a century.
He was left out of the squad for the quarterfinals and did not feature in the T20 tournament either.
Though he had hinted about his quitting KSCA, the sudden move has come as a surprise.
