IND vs SA: Dinesh Karthik shares heartwarming message for Rajat Patidar, Mukesh Kumar after their maiden ODI call-ups

Oct 3, 2022 - 18:30

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IND vs SA: Dinesh Karthik shares heartwarming message for Rajat Patidar, Mukesh Kumar after their maiden ODI call-ups

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Sunday announced the squad for the ODI series against South Africa, which is scheduled to commence from October 6. Notably, the selectors have given maiden ODI call-ups to middle-order batter Rajat Patidar and pacer Mukesh Kumar.

Patidar’s career has been on an upswing since making a breathtaking 112 for Royal Challengers Bangalore in IPL 2022 Eliminator against the Lucknow Super Giants at Kolkata.

Patidar went on to score 122 and 30 not out in Madhya Pradesh’s Ranji Trophy final win over Mumbai at Bengaluru. Recently, he scored two centuries, one of which was a mammoth 176, in four innings of India A’s multi-day series against New Zealand A to be the top run-scorer for the hosts with 319 runs at an average of 106.33. He also made 45 not out and 20 in one-day matches against New Zealand A in Chennai.

Mukesh, the right-arm medium pacer who represents Bengal in domestic cricket, picked up nine wickets at an average of 21.78 in the multi-day series against New Zealand A, including taking 5/86 on day one of the series. More recently, he rattled a famed Saurashtra batting line-up with his deadly spell of 4/23 for the Rest of India in the ongoing Irani Cup final in Rajkot.

Meanwhile, India’s veteran wicketkeeper-batter Dinesh Karthik has expressed his delight at the inclusion of Rajat Patidar and Mukesh Kumar in the ODI squad. Both Karthik and Patidar played for RCB in the IPL 2022.

Karthik also backed Sarfaraz Khan and Baba Indrajith to get included in the Test set-up after their prolific seasons in Ranji Trophy for their respective teams.

“So happy to see Rajat Patidar there, so deserves this selection. Well done to Mukesh Kumar too. Now Sarfaraz Khan and Indrajith baba into the test scheme of things . Can’t ignore such brilliant performers and performances. They’ve just been phenomenal TALENT APLENTY,” Karthik tweeted.