The names of Nitish Reddy and Harshit Rana came as a big surprise when BCCI announced the squad for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy last month. Both players made their debut in the Perth encounter and while Reddy has cemented his spot, Rana was forced to take a backstep after a subpar outing in Adelaide.
Reddy, on the other hand, has shown promise mostly with the bat although he has chipped in with both overs and wickets. But if we just focus on his batting numbers, the 21-year-old has found himself stranded in 40s on three occasions previously in the series. However, on Saturday with the onus completely on him and Washington Sundar, the former made perfect use of the opportunity and produced a statement knock at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).
Reddy along with Sundar stitched an almost perfect rescue act and by the end of Day 3 of the fourth Test, the former also went to complete his maiden Test century. The all-rounder returned unbeaten on 105 off 176 balls to help India reach 358/9 at Stumps.
While India still trail by 116 runs, Reddy's effort has brought the contest into balance especially after it felt that India would concede a lead of over 200. He and Sundar joined together when the scorecard read 221/7 and they added 127 runs for the eighth wicket. Sundar also completed his half-century in the process but it was Reddy, who did the bulk of scoring.
Puma, a company that Reddy is associated with as a brand ambassador, was happy with the youngster's effort and in an epic post took a brutal dig at former cricketer-turned-commentator Sanjay Manjrekar, who earlier this week had questioned the all-rounder's spot in the playing XI.
Manjrekar on Wednesday had shared a post on X questioning: "Will leaving Reddy out give India better balance?" Replying to the same, Puma dropped a photo of Reddy from an official photoshoot with the brand, where the all-rounder can be seen making a "shush" gesture while holding a bat on his other hand.
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