The loss against England highlighted a number of areas of concern they’ll need to address quickly

Mohammad Isam11-Oct-20231:56

Is the top order Bangladesh’s weakness?

For close to two decades, Bangladesh have proffered the notion that they need a good start to get anywhere – in a session, a match, a bilateral series or a tournament. They have always said that a good start allows them to settle in quickly. It is a sporting cliché. It is true for many teams. Bangladesh keep saying it because they lived this for a very long time.They have certainly found ways to win matches and series after getting bad starts on and off, but when they don’t win, like in their World Cup game against England in Dharamshala, they do not necessarily look a comfortable lot.While the fast bowlers have shown improvement in the last two years, they were ineffective in the first powerplay in both that game and the previous one against Afghanistan. With the bat, Bangladesh have used seven different opening pairs in 21 ODIs this year. They have lost four wickets for under 100 runs in eight out of their last ten ODIs.Related

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Bangladesh coach Chandika Hathurusinghe acknowledged it was concerning for the team. He was disappointed that the fast bowlers were not able to take the advantage of the early start with the Dharamsala pitch having enough in it to trouble the England openers.”If you don’t get a start, if you lose more than three wickets in the first powerplay, then you are not winning many matches,” Hathurusinghe said. “So, definitely it’s a concern for batting. When we play seven batters, we want our top order to fire so that’s a big concern. The fast bowlers were unusually off colour in the powerplay in the last two games. Normally in a day game, early on, there is something for the fast bowlers.”Even this game, there was seam movement early on. [The pitch was] a little tacky and two-paced. The two openers were playing and missing, there were mis-hits, and they were a little bit lucky. After that, they batted really well. So, if we had some early wickets, the story would have been different.”The blame however cannot just go to the misfiring fast bowlers or the revolving door of the openers. The Bangladesh think-tank, which is at its most crowded in recent memory, takes these decisions.It has been that sort of a start for Shakib Al Hasan and Bangladesh this World Cup•AFP/Getty ImagesTaskin Ahmed and Shoriful Islam bowled just two overs each in the powerplay – just two balls apiece to England’s centurion, Dawid Malan. Bangladesh’s plan was to attack Malan with offspin, which completely backfired. Malan scored at a strike rate of 151.42 against the offspin duo of Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Mahedi Hasan, who collectively bowled the most to him after the first powerplay.For a team that relies on match-ups, this was a bitter blow. Five of England’s top six are right-handers, so left-arm spinner Nasum Ahmed could have been a wiser choice if they wanted to attack the batters with the away-going delivery. Plus, while Shakib Al Hasan finished his spell of ten overs in the 32nd over, Taskin, the team’s premier fast bowler, bowled just six overs in the innings, which was baffling. It would not have been a bad call to bring Taskin on in the middle overs when the offspinners were getting hammered.Hathurusinghe praised Shoriful for his three wickets in quick succession towards the end, which he felt stopped England from getting to 400. “We were little disappointed the way we started,” he said. “We could have bowled a little bit more onto the stumps, especially in the first 10 overs. We came back well.”Shoriful, I thought was very brave to bowl those variations when we were really under pressure. They would have got 400 at one stage I thought. There are some positives but we didn’t bowl well.”Litton Das’ sparkling 76 apart, Bangladesh were never in the chase and a part of the issue was how the batting line-up was shaped. Rookie Tanzid Hasan now has 40 runs in six innings. His inexperience isn’t his fault as he was thrown into the deep end of tough Asia Cup and World Cup campaigns without being given a teething period.”It is a concern if you are not scoring, but then Litton coming into form in this game was a good positive for us,” Hathurusinghe said. “Tanzid scored runs in the two practice games, so he was in form. It is two failures. In the World Cup, it can happen for any team. I’m hoping those guys will fire, because most of the batters now got into form, and in the coming games, hopefully, we will perform as a group.”Bangladesh have also avoided carrying a back-up opener, believing Mehidy could do the job if needed. Against England, he was sent in at No. 5 replacing Towhid Hridoy. The move seemed unnecessary as Hridoy has scored heavily in that position since making his debut earlier this year. If they wanted to send Hridoy down the order and not stick to specific batting positions, then Mushfiqur Rahim could have been a better option at No. 5 against England.Bangladesh need to settle into a rhythm with their line-up and selection. The batting reshuffling must end and the bowling should go beyond mere match-ups. It is now up to the team management to follow their players in making mental adjustments quickly.

England have attacked unwisely, been sloppy in the field, and made selection mistakes

Ian Chappell02-Jul-2023England are looking more like a team resigned to the fate of losing the Ashes rather than the freewheeling confident bunch who felt they could comfortably achieve victory at home in any circumstances.The Australian team has great confidence and belief in captain Pat Cummins, who has proved his leadership style in a variety of conditions. England, on the other hand, are reeling, having lost a Test they thought they would win, at Edgbaston, and then seen their hopes at Lord’s dashed by all-round sloppy work in the field and a failure to cope with a bouncer attack from the opposition.Australia are growing in strength, while England are starting to question themselves, and this is a recipe for a disaster for the home side. They suffered an ignominious 4-0 hammering in Australia, and now the ugly scars are re-emerging; they’ll have trouble halting the slide.Related

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There is no doubt Ben Stokes is employing the right strategy in trying to win Test matches from the first ball; that is how the game is best played. What is in doubt is the ability of England – as they’re currently constructed – to successfully employ that strategy.England’s bowling and fielding have been disappointing, and now their batting has suffered a dramatic collapse against the short-pitched delivery. Major doubt is now evident in the English camp.It’s going to take a monumental display of strong leadership from Stokes to reboot England’s confidence to a point where they can turn the tables on Australia.Forget the first-innings declaration in the Edgbaston Test – that was a positive move. England lost that match because of their unbalanced, struggling attack, inept fielding, and their confusing and downright poor selection. They had an ageing attack that lacked variety and whose control over line and length was in question when confronted by an onslaught. They also don’t have the pace required to mount a meaningful bouncer barrage.When their batting – a source of comfort in the past – collapsed in a flurry of panicked shot-making at Lord’s, the doubts quickly resurfaced. That this occurred following a major injury to Australia’s prized offspinner Nathan Lyon only underlined England’s plight.

A bouncer barrage like Australia’s takes a physical toll on the bowlers, but if it helps secure an early series victory, the remaining Tests become a matter of coasting home

The England batters had no sensible answer when Australia resorted to a bouncer attack, and this gave Cummins’ men a huge boost. It’s true that Australia’s bowlers have the height and pace to employ bouncers well, but it helps when the opposition self-destructs. While it’s also true that a bouncer assault takes a physical toll on the bowlers, if it helps secure an early series victory, the remaining Tests become a matter of coasting home.It’s all well and good for England to say “That’s the way we play”, but when wild and woolly shot-making like in the first innings at Lord’s is on display, it’s time for the batters to answer some serious questions.In the field England are struggling to combat Steve Smith’s monumental thirst for runs, Usman Khawaja’s stubbornness, and the aggression of Travis Head. In addition, David Warner has shown tremendous resolve to overcome Stuart Broad’s domination. In the face of Australia’s determination, England needed to field superbly but they failed dismally.England’s error-ridden selection was summed up by Moeen Ali’s recall. he was not a successful spinner against Australia even at his peak and yet England chose to bring him back, making yet another serious miscalculation.Now that England’s batting has stumbled and fallen, the selection blunders become more apparent. In the past England haven’t been quick to change tack and resolve thorny issues. I’ll be surprised if the modus operandi changes under this selection group, while Australia are likely to go from strength to strength.Trying to win from the first ball is admirable, but gifting your wicket to the opposition with reckless shot-making is not a tactic designed to beat good sides. Australia under Cummins are a good side.

At the 2019 World Cup, Kuldeep was smashed by the same opposition, which started a downward spiral for him

Andrew Fidel Fernando28-Oct-2023If you’re a mystery spinner in 2023, there are countless close-ups of your grip, dozens of analysts breaking down your release from slo-mo footage, and opposition batters poring over every flick of your fingers.You think you’re the finished product? That deception will always be your friend? That you will forever leave batters gawking open-mouthed at clattered stumps? The world has news for you. Whatever trickery has brought you here may not last. Under the blinding spotlight of international cricket, so little of your game can remain in the shadows.So it was for Kuldeep Yadav in the 2019 World Cup, on a cloudy Birmingham afternoon. Kuldeep, partnered then with Yuzvendra Chahal (giving rise to #KulCha), had in 2018 magicked his way repeatedly through the England batting order, claiming nine wickets at 16.44, in a three-match ODI series.Related

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But a year later, there Kuldeep was, being bullied by the same opposition. Jason Roy smoked him repeatedly down the ground, Jonny Bairstow danced down the pitch and thumped him for sixes or stayed in his crease and reverse-swept him for fours. In his ten overs, Kuldeep was ransacked for 72.The next year was also unkind. After being dropped from the XI before the end of that World Cup campaign, Kuldeep went for a run-a-ball through his next nine ODIs. In that time he averaged 44.72 – a wristspinner both struggling for wickets and failing to build pressure through the middle overs. When he was let go from the squad entirely, you wondered if that had been the last of him at the top level.It wouldn’t be the first time, right? Mystery spinners – match-winners when they are hot, liabilities when unravelled. The genre of cricketers most likely to have a shelf life.That Kuldeep has successfully reinvented himself, and bowled his way back into the India XI, is credit to his own pursuit of evolution, of course. But it also speaks to an increasing resilience in Indian cricket, which provides players multiple paths back. If it is not the National Cricket Academy, it is a state body, and failing that, the IPL. Whatever ails you, there is knowledge, there is investment, there is support.Kuldeep Yadav was taken apart by Daryl Mitchell but came back strongly•ICC/Getty ImagesIn this World Cup, roughly four years after his game broke down, Kuldeep has been a vital part of India’s attack, never going wicketless, proving difficult to dominate, and mounting a strong resurgence even in the one match in which he was blasted.It is in that New Zealand game in Dharamsala that all of Kuldeep 2.0 was in evidence. He had bowled slower in the early overs, looking for big turn, but when Daryl Mitchell came down the pitch and repeatedly launched him straight, Kuldeep would find ways to reply. When Mitchell shaped to reverse-sweep, Kuldeep would usually slip in the quicker ball – sometimes bowled like a cross-seam delivery, not looking for sideways movement off the surface, but frequently bowled at more than 100kph, and occasionally gaining a little extra bounce when the ball hits the seam.In general, there is just more zip in Kuldeep’s deliveries now. The old revolutions on the ball, and the turn, is still there, but the most obvious of the technical changes is his straighter approach to the crease, which in turn means there is more body behind the action, which takes stress off the shoulder, and a stronger front arm. Essentially, when batters are crashing him for boundaries, as Mitchell – and to a lesser extent Rachin Ravindra – did in his first five overs, Kuldeep now has an entire defensive section of his bowling to fall back on. He can slide them quickly with the arm, get others to skid through into the pads out of the front of the hand, and slip in fast, wide googlies with the leg side open, tempting right-hand batters to drag him against the turn.As for many other successful mystery spinners, it is having strong defensive options for when pitches are flat, or batters are flying, that allows them to be more persistent with their attacking deliveries. If boundaries come, there is belief that control can be regained, both within the bowler, and from his captain. After going for 48 in his first five overs against New Zealand, Kuldeep was not rushed out of the attack. His last five overs cost only 25, despite his earlier tormentor Mitchell still being at the crease. He also claimed two wickets, both with quickish deliveries. He should have had another – the wicket of Mitchell – had Jasprit Bumrah held a straightforward chance at long-off.There is irony to Kuldeep showcasing his newfound mettle ahead of his next World Cup game against England. In their own way, England’s white-ball team has come full circle too, reprising that familiar England avatar, in which they drag their carcasses around the tournament.To the extent that they have been able to prepare for India, following their crushing defeat to Sri Lanka on Thursday, England will have pored over footage of Kuldeep 2.0. Perhaps they will have clocked too, that his game does not seem so easy to dismantle as it had once been in Birmingham.

Bangladesh have three wins against India of late, all close ones – holding their nerve should such big moments present themselves again will be key

Mohammad Isam18-Oct-20235:31

Bond and Dasgupta preview India vs Bangladesh

For the sole purpose of keeping anxiety levels down for the next 24 hours, we will only stick to ODIs only when talking about how Bangladesh have dealt with crunch moments in the past. Digging deep in tough moments has been an issue for Bangladesh for the longest time. Some believe they are still a team that stumbles under pressure, but twin miracles from Mehidy Hasan Miraz against India late last year have somewhat changed that perception.When Mehidy and Mustafizur Rahman pulled off a one-wicket win, it was their closest win against a higher-ranked side. Three days after Mehidy engineered that first miracle in Dhaka, Bangladesh clinched a tough five-run win to seal the ODI series. It ensured India remained without an ODI series win in Bangladesh for nine years, having last won in 2014.Then came the Asia Cup win in September, by six runs, another instance of Bangladesh holding their nerve.Related

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However, Bangladesh coach Chandika Hathurusinghe said that those hard-fought victories aren’t the games they are looking at for motivation before they take on India in Pune. Instead, he wants to channel the energy from the two upsets achieved by Netherlands and Afghanistan this week at the World Cup.”We had success in the recent past against India, but it is a different ball game at the World Cup,” Hathurusinghe said on match eve. “We are hoping to have a complete performance. [If] India, the in-form team in the World Cup, have a not-so-good game, and we play to our potential, it will serve us. We need to start well. We are all motivated to win every game from now on.”Because of what happened in the last week, the World Cup is really opening up. We are all inspired by that. We have six games to go, we still think we can win those games. That’s the motivation and inspiration for tomorrow.”More than winning the crunch moments, Bangladesh’s immediate concern is getting into that position first of all. After beating Afghanistan to begin, they were beaten by England and New Zealand convincingly. But their seamers could be a point of difference in Pune.”We are not an unsettled team. We are not performing yet to our expectations,” he said. “I know that the players want to do better. We haven’t had a complete performance in the batting group. Hopefully this game, as we are playing on a really good pitch, and we are expecting to have a complete batting performance tomorrow.”Bangladesh’s fast-bowling unit can be key tomorrow given the conditions on this wicket. They have done well in the past. If you consider that and their performance in the last two or three games, they would be the first to say that they haven’t done enough. They have spoken about it. They can do better than this, and they have done in the past.”File photo – Bangladesh had plenty of support in Dharamsala•ICC via Getty Images’India are scary’Hathurusinghe said that Bangladesh will stick to their strengths when deciding what to do at the toss, if given the option.”If we win the toss, we decide what’s good for us. We won’t go by what India is good at or not good at,” he said. “India have every area covered. They have strike bowlers up front. [Jasprit] Bumrah has almost come to his best. They have good, experienced spinners for the middle overs. Their top order is firing. They are scary. They are playing without much fear. It also looks like they are enjoying their cricket at the moment.”One thing Hathurusinghe wants to do as the World Cup progresses is to keep the noise from the outside away from the team. That said, he doesn’t want Bangladesh fans to stop being passionate. He said he is seeking a balance.”The passion is the beauty of cricket in this part of the world. That’s why we are here,” he said. “For the fans. I love it. It won’t affect me. I am doing the job. I have to keep the emotion away. Keep the players the best opportunity to prepare for the game. We enjoy the passion.”The Bangladesh journalists have heard this from me before: if you are not motivated to play for your country, you don’t need any other motivation. So he shouldn’t be here.”Trying to keep the noise down in Pune will not be practical. It is likely to be a sellout crowd. Even though India’s home support will be by far the loudest, Bangladesh’s big fans – the Tigers and Bulu Das – have already made heads turn at the venue with their cheering for Bangladesh during practice sessions.Will these travelling fans get to see Bangladesh triumph over India for the fourth time in 12 months? They can’t afford to let any chance slip by, especially in the big moments, and if they do that successfully, who knows?

After a series of injuries at a very young age, she’s ready to grab her WPL opportunity to move to the next level

Srinidhi Ramanujam21-Feb-2024SB Keerthana is a purpose-driven player. After losing almost three to four years to injuries – she is still just 23 – when she was doing well, getting picked by Mumbai Indians in this WPL has reignited the legspinner’s hopes of playing cricket at the highest level.Having been drawn to the sport at a very young age, she represented Tamil Nadu at the Under-16 level at the age of ten and quickly moved from Under-19 to Under-23 and then the senior side. However, life slowed down for Keerthana a year before the pandemic. At 18, she featured in the Senior Women’s Challenger Trophy in 2018-19 and was playing alongside the likes of Sneh Rana and Renuka Singh. But, soon after the season, she had knee and ankle injuries back-to-back – ACL, LSL, meniscus tear – and a few years were lost just doing a lot of rehabilitation and recovery. Though Keerthana kept playing tournaments with these injuries, the results weren’t enough for the take-off she was aiming for.”Your career peaks from the age of 19 to 25,” Keerthana told ESPNcricinfo. “I led India Red in the Challenger Trophy at the Under-19 level, Under-23 level, and the senior level. I was there in the limelight [2018-2019 season]. But after the injury, I was off the radar. Only in the last two seasons I have been injury-free.Related

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“In cricket, if you go off the radar, it’s very difficult to come back because it’s a competitive game. You know you are replaceable. For me, to make that comeback, it took a lot of mental strength.”Now, to be able to share a dressing room with a star like Amelia Kerr – who is the same age as her – Keerthana had to undergo several changes. This included having a dairy-free and gluten-free diet, shedding two to three kilograms by focusing on strength and conditioning workouts and, as a result, feeling lighter on the run-up.In the initial days, she trained under Sundar, India allrounder Washington Sundar’s father, at Wesley Higher Secondary School in Chennai, before moving to MAC Spin Academy to be coached by Peter Fernandez. Sometime in 2019-2020, she sought the help of TS Mukund, father of former Tamil Nadu – and India – opener Abhinav Mukund, to work on her variations and ball speed.”After the injury, she was very slow,” Mukund said. “She had the talent even in 2015. Having known her from a young age, I found her good for her slinging action. A few years ago, I met her somewhere and asked her to come to the Mylapore Club. She was not able to turn the ball either way, googly or legspin, she was just bowling straight.”I had to fine-tune a few things – from the run-up to her bowling action to the placement of the leg. She used to come to the academy at 5.30am and bowl for an hour-and-a-half without a break to the Under-19 boys. She did the same drill for more than an hour in the afternoon to rectify her errors. This routine went on for six days during off season as well.”She was almost on the verge of breaking down because of the strenuous drills we had after the injury. But she had the dedication and willpower.”

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Hailing from a middle-class joint family that had great enthusiasm for cricket, Keerthana used to accompany her cousin and father – Balakrishnan, who owns a taxi business – to the ground to “get some physical activity done because my father was keen on it”. Growing up in the lanes of Triplicane – a locality that’s merely a kilometre from Chepauk – her exposure to cricket was not limited. She was immediately fascinated with spin bowling.Cut to last year…Technical fine-tuning aside, she had a major learning curve when the former Middlesex cricketer Tom Scollay spoke about the importance of mental conditioning in a seminar conducted by Mukund in Chennai.”I got a great perspective on life after Scollay’s interactive session,” Keerthana said. “Not everybody touches upon the emotional part of an athlete while speaking on mental conditioning… how you can’t control people’s expectations while going through a lean patch. He also explained how emotions can help you improve in your cricket. Even we have certain expectations of ourselves, but when the performances don’t match our expectations, how do you handle yourself, mentally and emotionally. About expectations from coaches and people around us. I learnt how to accept failure during a low phase from him. This realisation has helped me move forward tremendously.”

“The only thing I had in mind was, ‘I have to grab this opportunity and use this platform to move to a higher level’. There’s a saying, ‘What’s meant for you will find its way’. I started to believe strongly in this phrase after getting picked in the WPL”SB Keerthana

All those learnings were viewed in tangible terms in the domestic circuit very soon. In the Senior Women’s T20 Trophy last November, Keerthana picked up 12 wickets in seven games at an economy rate of 5.40, finishing as the joint-fifth-highest wicket-taker. In the Senior Women’s One-Day Trophy that was held in January, she took 14 wickets in seven matches at an economy of 3.24. A week before the auction in December, she was called for trials by Mumbai Indians. After going unsold initially, she was bought by the franchise for INR 10 lakh in the final round of the accelerated auction.”Everyone was calling my father, and not me, to congratulate after the news came out,” she said with a laugh. “The only thing I had in mind was, ‘I have to grab this opportunity and use this platform to move to a higher level’. I also realised that, somewhere, your hard work will pay off. There’s a saying, ‘What’s meant for you will find its way’. I started to believe strongly in this phrase after getting picked in the WPL.”Being a part of the title-winning squad that also has the likes of Jhulan Goswami, Charlotte Edwards and Kiran More in the support staff, Keerthana wants to just utilise the tournament to gather as much knowledge as possible.”There’s so much to learn from players on their work ethics and how they approach the game, mentally too. When you have someone like Amelia Kerr in the squad, who has done so much for New Zealand cricket, being at your age, I feel I have so much to learn to move up the ladder.”Only time will tell if Keerthana can progress to the next level, but for an optimist like her, the WPL spot is a reminder that it can happen.

Though “really happy” with his form, Padikkal says “the ultimate prize” is the Ranji Trophy title

Deivarayan Muthu09-Feb-2024After Devdutt Padikkal went from 88 to a century with a punchy sequence of 6,4,4 off Tamil Nadu captain R Sai Kishore, he pumped his fist, spun around, and then raised his bat to acknowledge the cheers from a crowd of almost 1000 on Friday afternoon at Chepauk.Padikkal countered everything that Tamil Nadu threw at him. Sandeep Warrier smacked him on his helmet and unprotected shoulder, but he shook those blows off and hooked him away to the boundary. When M Mohammed went much fuller and attacked the stumps, Padikkal repeatedly pumped him over his head. It prompted Sai Kishore to station himself – the tallest fielder on the park – at straight long-on, almost right behind the bowler.Despite Sai Kishore taking a leaf out of MS Dhoni’s playbook, Padikkal kept launching the ball in the arc between midwicket and long-on. With both the Tamil Nadu left-arm spinners – Sai Kishore and Ajith Ram turning the ball into him – Padikkal took calculated risks to disrupt their lengths and lines.Related

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“I was just waiting for them to flight it up a little bit,” Padikkal said at his post-day press conference. “Both of them are really good bowlers and both of them were bowling really consistently in those [good] areas. So, we were just waiting for them to flight it up a little bit more and trying to make use of that opportunity because whenever those opportunities come, you have to score runs off them. Otherwise, you will probably get stuck.”Padikkal had walked out to bat at No.3 after his captain Mayank Agarwal was castled by Sai Kishore for 20. He is primarily an opening batter, but has been batting largely at No.3 in the past two domestic seasons to let the more experienced Agarwal and R Samarth do their thing at the top.”It’s just the way our team is set up,” Padikkal said. “I don’t mind batting at No.3 and I don’t mind opening either. So that doesn’t really make a huge difference. So I just want to make sure wherever I bat, I contribute to the team.”An acute intestinal issue over the past two years affected Padikkal’s form and fitness – in the 2022-23 season, he managed only 260 runs in seven Ranji innings at an average of 37.14. After regaining full fitness, Padikkal has now hit the high notes with the bat. He was Karnataka’s top run-getter in the 50-overs Vijay Hazare Trophy with 465 runs in five innings at an average of 155 and strike rate of 120.46. He has followed it up with four hundreds in six first-class games this season. Padikkal hopes that his stellar run will culminate in a Ranji title for Karnataka.

“How much ever you perform individually, if you’re not winning the Ranji Trophy, it doesn’t matter.”Devdutt Padikkal

“To be honest, in the last couple of years I wasn’t doing too well,” Padikkal said. “My performances were naturally dipping because of that. But I was always confident enough that I’d be back scoring runs at some point. Now that I’m back in terms of my fitness and health completely, I’m really happy I’m back scoring runs as well.”We all understand that when you’re not scoring runs, it’s not a great place to be. Really happy that I’m getting runs and helping the team win. For Karnataka, winning the Ranji Trophy is the ultimate prize. How much ever you perform individually, if you’re not winning the Ranji Trophy, it doesn’t matter.”If Padikkal could convert his century into a double on Saturday, on a Chepauk pitch that is already showing signs of variable bounce, he could take Karnataka towards the top of Group C in the Elite table and a step closer to that title.

He has paid SRH back more than the INR 20 lakh they got him for, and is more than likely to get a bigger payday come the next IPL auction

Vishal Dikshit15-May-2024Nitish Kumar Reddy wasn’t expecting to be retained by Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) before the last IPL auction. Can’t blame him – he featured in just two games in IPL 2023 in which he didn’t get to bat and leaked 54 runs in five wicketless overs.”Even I thought no one is going to pick me and suddenly SRH retained me,” Reddy says in a chat with ESPNcricinfo on the sidelines of IPL 2024. “I was like, ‘I have to work a little more’.”While some of the top allrounders earned massive deals in the IPL 2023 auction, Reddy, hardly a big force in the IPL circuit, was signed for his base price of INR 20 lakh, picked primarily as a bowler who can bat a bit.Related

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He displayed his bowling prowess earlier this year for Andhra in a Ranji Trophy game, when his 5 for 64 had Mumbai in trouble at one point. Reddy bowled with a fairly new ball, removed Ajinkya Rahane for a golden duck, swung the ball both ways, and later also dismissed Shreyas Iyer from around the wicket with the old ball.The SRH think-tank would have patted themselves on the back for investing in a teenager who would become Andhra’s top wicket-taker in the last Ranji season with an average of just 18.76. But that’s not all there is to him as we have discovered more recently.Reddy, who calls himself a “genuine allrounder”, got his IPL opportunity of this IPL season when Mayank Agarwal was unwell, against Chennai Super Kings (CSK). In the eight balls he faced in that game, Reddy showed glimpses of his temperament, reverse-sweeping Ravindra Jadeja for four and the completing SRH’s victory with a straight six off Deepak Chahar.A much bigger test, however, awaited Reddy in the next match when the Punjab Kings (PBKS) quicks reduced SRH to 39 for 3 in five overs, the trio of Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma and Aiden Markram gone.SRH typically want Henrich Klaasen to walk out in the second half of the innings for the big hits, and for that they needed someone to steer the ship for a few more overs. Reddy moved along to 14 off 17 balls, with Rahul Tripathi falling on the way, to rebuild for his team. It was one of those occasions when SRH’s high-risk-high-reward batting approach at the top didn’t work.

“I don’t really feel satisfied when the team scores 270 and I score 50 or 40 runs of those. But when the team really needs me, like when we are 4 for 10 or something like that, and I can go there and take the team till the end or the last over… I want to showcase that because that’s what my role is”

“We know it’s not going to work every time. It’s not like we will go hard on opponents all the time, but one bad game, one bad ball, such things happen and we have to be prepared for early wickets,” Reddy says. “You can see at first we scored huge runs and after that we collapsed. So I’ve been thinking at the back of my mind for this situation that if the team is going to collapse, I have to be ready for that situation.”Once Reddy had set his eye in, he figured out that the fast bowlers were getting more out of the fresh pitch in Mullanpur, so it was better to go after spin. He soon laid into Harpreet Brar for a 15-run over that turned the tide of the innings. From 66 for 4 after ten, SRH went on to post 182, despite losing Klaasen for just 9, because Reddy slammed 64 off 37 – including 22 more off Brar in the 15th over. Reddy’s maiden T20 fifty had come in the IPL, that too in a rescue act.”I just love playing these kinds of innings,” he says. “I don’t really feel satisfied when the team scores 270 and I score 50 or 40 runs of those. But when the team really needs me, like when we are 4 for 10 or something like that, and I can go there and take the team till the end or the last over… I want to showcase that because that’s what my role is.”A few games later, SRH were under the pump again. They had lost back-to-back games to Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) and CSK, and then got to 37 for 2 after six overs, their poorest powerplay of IPL 2024, against Rajasthan Royals (RR), who possess one of the best bowling attacks in the competition.With Head for company, Reddy went back to his template of building a base and then identifying a bowler to take on, no matter how high profile. Once he was on a comfortable 22 off 19, he tore into Yuzvendra Chahal to change the momentum of the innings. Two sixes over the bowler’s head and two fours on the off side meant Reddy had smashed the star legspinner for 20 in an over.He finished on 76 not out in 42 balls. Bhuvneshwar Kumar won the Player-of-the-Match award after SRH’s win for his 3 for 41, but Reddy was ESPNcricinfo’s MVP.Nitish Kumar Reddy has held his own in a team of superstars•AFP/Getty ImagesReddy, however, rues the losses to RCB and CSK before that. In both those games, SRH were chasing 200-plus totals and were 56 for 4 and 40 for 3 respectively within the powerplay. The stage was set, but Reddy couldn’t capitalise on his run-a-ball starts, and SRH slipped down the points table.”I loved the Punjab innings but after that against CSK and RCB, I wanted to take the team till the end,” Reddy says. “I was very disappointed for those two innings, and I was thinking if we have to be on top of the table, I have to take the team till the end when the team collapses. That’s what my role is. So ,when I didn’t do well in those two matches, I felt really bad and I feel winning those [kind of] games will be more satisfying for me; I wasn’t satisfied at all.”Coming back to this game with RR, winning like that with a crucial knock after two early wickets, that knock really boosted me.”While being the SRH crisis man, Reddy has so far scored 239 runs from seven innings while striking at 152.22 and averaging a formidable 47.80, with more sixes (17) than fours (12). The highlight has been his ability to change the course of a game with one big over, even if a big-name bowler is against him.He has scored 23 off ten against Chahal, 21 off eight against R Ashwin, 19 off ten against Avesh Khan, and ten off five against Kuldeep Yadav. Reddy attributes this largely to match awareness and some homework.”I just watch a couple of videos and variations of bowlers before going into the match,” he says. “And, according to the field, you will get to know what ball [the bowler] is going to bowl. It’s just that the starting phase of batting will be a little difficult to get boundaries or to get that opportunity to get the gaps. But once you cross 20-30, you will feel like you know what the bowler is going to do next, and you will have a good idea of what the pitch is also behaving like.3:18

‘Time to start investing in Nitish Reddy the allrounder’

“I would take some time in my innings and after that I accelerate. I will choose a bowler or someone who is good to strike against.”Reddy relies a lot on his base of solid technique to score in the ‘V’ in front and to pull the short balls, options that have helped him score a lot this IPL. He was also aware before the season that he had to raise his batting, especially against spinners, knowing that he would largely bat in the middle overs. One shot he worked a lot on was the reverse sweep, which has earned him 22 runs off just ten balls this IPL.”Spinners mostly keep three fielders around point area [cover point, backward point, and short third] and one sweeper cover, so it’s really hard [to score],” Reddy says about his reverse sweep. “You have to time the ball, otherwise you’ll be out. So I just practice the reverse sweep; it’s easy to score over [the three short fielders off side].”A habit Reddy has developed over time is visualising such situations when in his hotel room, plus shadow batting, which he often does during training sessions at the ground as well. It’s this hunger “to always improve” that has brought him quick success in the IPL, which he wants to build on to become a gun allrounder like his idols Hardik Pandya and Ben Stokes.”I want to take it to the next level, there are not many people like that [proper allrounders],” he says. “Maybe in half a year I might become the allrounder [I want to be]. I guess in bowling I need to be more specific also. Like I know I’m not getting the chances, but I have to read the game. I’m not getting that experience in bowling as of now, I am just bowling one or two overs.

“I feel being an allrounder is a difficult job. At the same time, we are the match-winners. It’s not easy to take the recovery part properly to maintain your body, like you have to make sure you’re in a good space”

“It’s okay, but I can learn something from T Natarajan, Bhuvneshwar, they all are doing good so I want to gain that experience through watching them and I want to practice a little more because you can see in India A and B levels there is no impact rule. There I can get my bowling chances and improve.”Reddy admits “it’s really hard” being an allrounder because of the different demands and the toll it takes on the body.”I feel being an allrounder is a difficult job,” he says. “At the same time, we are the match-winners. It’s not easy to take the recovery part properly to maintain your body, like you have to make sure you’re in a good space. So you have to recover, look after your body or maintenance, your fitness so that’s where your performance will be connecting. If you miss even one or two sessions, it will affect you on the ground, so it’s really hard to be an allrounder.”But, as I mentioned, I always love to be a match-winner, so I don’t have any choice. I have to be an allrounder and I will work on my fitness and everything.”Reddy has taken the first few steps towards it.He was named the best cricketer in the Under-16 category by the BCCI at their annual awards function in 2018. Six years on, he has become a vital cog between the hard-hitters at the top and in the lower order for SRH.He probably shouldn’t blame himself if he is not retained by SRH after IPL 2024, as that will be the big one, but if he is let go by them and picked for a much bigger amount than the INR 20 lakh he currently gets, he can claim to have earned it.

After England became the first team to reach the T20 World Cup semi-finals, the Switch Hit team meet to discuss their hopes of back-to-back titles

ESPNcricinfo staff24-Jun-2024After their group-stage struggles, England became the first team to seal a berth in the T20 World Cup semi-finals, with a clinical demolition of the USA in Barbados. In this week’s Switch Hit, Alan Gardner, Matt Roller and Andrew Miller review their circuitous route to another tournament knock-out phase, and the prospects of Jos Buttler’s men making it back-to-back titles, after their victory in Australia in 2022.