Thinking of Lord's Test 2014. Ishant's 7/74 won him the PoTM. People still remember and talk about the Rahane century on the first day on a green pitch. But how come nobody talks about Bhuvi's all round performance?- 6/82 with the ball, 36 (84) and 52 (71) with the bat.
I heard to this song when I was in school... and it stayed with me ever since..
Now I found the right moment in #TheParadise for #Yeshanagula :)
Here's the lyric video.
-- https://t.co/eqmXwipqDm
Funny how these things work. Sai Sudharsan got injured before Galle Test and suddenly Devdutt Padikkal, walks into a slot India had auditioned 7 different batters for across 27 Tests since Pujara left, all of them averaging a combined 33.33.
He scored 167 in Galle, now 117 in Colombo & just like that this accidental selection stopped looking accidental.
Rewind to when he was 10, growing up in Edappal, Kerala. His father, a medical professional, noticed something in how his son played & made a decision most families would think twice about, he uprooted the whole household & moved to Bengaluru just so young Devdutt could train properly.
No guarantees came with that move, just a coach named Naseeruddin at a local academy and a kid who, even at 11, could pull short balls off his chest with a calm that older players struggled to find.
That calm shows up now in his technique. Coaches worked with him to bring his hands in tighter, shorten a backlift that used to leave him exposed outside off, built a game designed to smother spin rather than chase it. Against Sri Lankan spinners in Galle he collected close to 25% of his runs purely through sweeps,then stepped down the track & launched them over long on when situation called for it.
Look closer and this isn't some sudden bolt from nowhere either. His stocks have been climbing quietly for months now, big scores in Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, 725 runs at 90 average in last season of Vijay Hazare Triphy, 543 runs at 60.33 average in Ranji Trophy 2025-26, 464 runs at 168 strike rate in IPL 2026 and somewhere in between all that, experience of leading Karnataka as captain.
By the time Sri Lanka came around, he had already done the hard work everywhere else. Test cricket was just the last room in house waiting for him to walk in.
A family gambled on a 10 year old once. Years later, an injury to someone else finally gave that gamble its moment and Padikkal made certain it wouldn't be wasted.