The likes of Nitish Kumar Reddy and pacer Harshit Rana ended up getting their debut caps in the first Test match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against Australia that started on Friday in Perth. Nitish made his T20I debut against Bangladesh while Harshit got his maiden India cap. On the back of his brilliant IPL performance for Kolkata Knight Riders in IPL 2024, Rana ended up getting an India call in the Border Gavaskar Trophy.
Harshit has taken part in 10 first-class matches, where he scalped 43 wickets. Nitish on the other hand had a great T20I debut. India’s star pacer Jasprit Bumrah is leading the Indian team since regular skipper Rohit Sharma is on paternity leave. Harshit Rana has scalped 43 wickets at an average of 24.00 and also smashed 469 runs at an average of 42.63.
Reddy came into the limelight after a brilliant 2024 IPL season and also ended up getting the Emerging Player of the Year award after making 303 runs for Sunrisers Hyderabad at a strike rate of 142.92.
“We are going to bat first, looks like a good wicket. Very confident with our preparation. We played a Test match here in 2018 so we know what to expect. The wicket gets quicker. Nitish makes his debut. We have 4 quicks and Washi is the lone spinner”, Jasprit Bumrah said at the time of the toss.
“We were 50-50, either way we are pretty happy. Feel well placed, pretty fresh. Any format we (India-Australia) play seems fiercely fought. Nathan McSweeney makes our debut at the top of the order”, Pat Cummins said.
Australia: Pat Cummins (C), Alex Carey (WK), Usman Khawaja, Nathan McSweeney, Marnus Labuschagne, Steven Smith, Travis Head, Mitchell Marsh, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood, Josh Inglis, Scott Boland.
India: Jasprit Bumrah (C), Rishabh Pant (WK), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Devdutt Padikkal, Virat Kohli, Dhruv Jurel, Nitish Reddy, Ravichandran Ashwin, Akash Deep, Mohammed Siraj, Sarfaraz Khan, Prasidh Krishna, Ravindra Jadeja, Harshit Rana, Washington Sundar, Abhimanyu Easwaran.