As Sachin is out of the Irani trophy due to injury, Tamil Nadu batsmen Subramaniam Badrinath gets his place and hopes for a good score against Delhi, who are the Ranji champions. The match will take place in Vadodara.
"Maybe the time has come for me now. It’s a great feeling … Tremendous to know that I’ll play for the Rest. I would like to make use of this opportunity; a good knock means chance to make the Test squad against Australia," said Badrinath, who is now captaining India A in the triangular series with Australia A and New Zealand A.
"I can’t ask for more, if I make a debut against the world champions," Badrinath told a news paper from Chennai in an interview.
He also said he doesn’t believe in luck and he believes in hard work.
"I am not somebody, who is a firm believer in luck. I believe in hardwork and wait for the right opportunity. The incidents in the past ( of coming so close to selection but not making it ) have made me strong mentally," he said.
What he said is true if one can see his first class averages of 55.92 and 40 + in List A matches. Only Ricky Ponting and Sachin Tendulkar are the other two batsmen, who are still active and with at least 50 innings, have a higher first class average.
He had three successful Ranji seasons, from 2005-06 where he averaged almost 80 by scoring 636 runs from seven matches. Badrinath never got a place in the playing eleven of the national side, though he was called up for the three ODI Australia series that took place in last October. But the calm and cool headed Badrinath never gave up his will and showed his anguish.
Call it whatever you want as luck or fate, Badrinath, having remained in the sidelines for almost one year, was named in the squad and got chance to play in the Sri Lankan ODI series as replacement for the injured Sachin Tendulkar.
"A coincidence," says Badrinath, who proved his place in the team was worth and didn’t fail to produce a match winning knock.
Batting at number 7, where batsmen never get enough balls to score big runs, simply throwing their wickets away in the slog overs, Badrinath showed a lot of character and maturity in his defying 27 not out, very crucial in the context of a low-scoring game against the Lankan’s at dambulla, where India won by three wickets and Badrinath got high praises from Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni.
"It feels great to have begun like that. Being a debut series, it was very important for me. I did not want to do anything extraordinary but played according to the context of the game and it worked as Dhoni and I scored the vital runs," Badrinath said, recalling his 60-run sixth wicket partnership with the captain MSD, which took the team within striking distance of a win in the second one-dayer.
"It’s important that the selection has come at a time when you’re at peak form. I have been batting well recently. I had a very good last year, scoring big in India A tours to Zimbabwe and Kenya, and in the home series against South Africa A. Moreover, I’ve been scoring runs in all forms of the game," he said. In the same vein, Badrinath also given a lot of credit to the Indian Premier League (IPL)-effect.
"Yes, certainly, it played a role to come under the notice… It was a hugely sucessful, a revelation after all," said Badrinath, who played for Chennai Super Kings that finished runners-up.
In IPL he averaged 32 from 16 matches with two half-centuries.
With Kaif back in the rest of India squad and Rohit Sharma and Suresh Raina already there, there is a talk that these guys along with Badrinath will be joining the middle-order to fill up the Voids, which will be created when the FAB FOUR (Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman) leaves in future.
But Badrinath had something against this one who has 4586 runs from 65 First Class matches .
"They (the Big Four) have more than 70,000 international runs between them. To think of filling in their shoes is something very big. I just hope to do well if given the chance," Badrinath said ahead of their match against New Zealand A on Sunday, which incidentally will be his last in the A Series.