Nitish Kumar Reddy’s rise has been meteoric. He was bought by the Sunrisers Hyderabad for just Rs 20 lakh in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 auction. His performance was such that in the next six months, he made his India cricket team debut in two formats (Test and T20I).
It’s not just the fact that an India cap has been handed to him, but he’s become a mainstay in both formats. At 21, he has shown immense potential. Being an all-rounder who bowls pace makes him even more valuable. Given that the Men in Blue have a settled team in ODIs, he wasn’t named in the 15-man squad for the ICC Champions Trophy. But would he make the non-travelling reserves over Shivam Dube?
Nitish Kumar Reddy at the NCA
For the uninformed, Nitish Reddy had sustained a side strain during the India vs. England T20I series. He was replaced with Dube and made his way to the Board of Control for Cricket in India’s (BCCI) Centre of Excellence (formerly the National Cricket Academy) in Bengaluru.
He’s been toiling hard there, and right now, it’s not sure how long he’ll take to recover. So the question is, did the BCCI not include Nitish Reddy in the reserves list because he was injured?
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Shivam Dube picked on merit or as a replacement
Dube was part of India’s ODI team in Sri Lanka last year. But that was particularly because Hardik Pandya made himself available. At that point, Nitish Reddy hadn’t made his debut either. Since then, the 21-year-old has become India’s pace-bowling all-rounder after Hardik.
As far as batting goes, Nitish is far superior in talent. To have a 180 strike rate in T20Is and a Test hundred in Australia isn’t a small feat. He’s also more flexible than Dube when it comes to batting position. Also, as of now, he doesn’t have a weakness. We know Dube can struggle against short-pitch balls and high pace. Many view him as a spin basher. That’s not the case with Nitish.
Let’s talk bowling now. Not much separates them there. But Nitish has room to improve with a 10-year age differential benefit. But we are talking about the present here. Let’s say they are dead even with the ball. Team India has enough southpaws and spin hitters; what they could need is someone who can anchor and bash the bowlers as per the match situation. All of this suggests that Gautam Gambhir and Rohit Sharma would have wanted Nitish Kumar Reddy in the reserves over Shivam Dube; that is, if he wasn’t injured.
India’s squad for ICC Champions Trophy
Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill (vc), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), Hardik Pandya, Arshdeep, Axar Patel, Ravindra Jadeja, Arshdeep Singh, Mohammed Shami, Kuldeep Yadav, Rishabh Pant (wk), Varun Chakravarthy, Washington Sundar, Harshit Rana
Non-travelling reserves: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Mohammed Siraj, Shivam Dube
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