Ruturaj Gaikwad walked off the Raipur outfield with mixed feelings: a maiden one-day international hundred to his name, yet another series slipping away from India. The 28-year-old right-hander, known almost exclusively as a top-order dasher, had never batted lower than No.3 in 86 List-A innings. Asked to fill the No.4 vacancy left by the injured Shreyas Iyer, he responded with 105 from 83 balls – tidy footwork, calm tempo, and the sort of strike rotation the middle order often craves.
“[The team management] told me that I would be batting at No. 4 this series,” Gaikwad said after the match. “I feel it’s a privilege to have that kind of confidence from the management towards an opener. So I took it that way.”
Those words came a day after a scratchy 8 in Ranchi. Plenty of openers have floundered when pushed down the list; Gaikwad instead treated it as an extended power-play after the field spread.
“In the one-day format, even when I was opening the innings, I always tried to make sure that whenever I was set, I was able to bat till the 45th over and capitalise after that. So I knew somewhat how to play between overs 11 to 40, how to rotate strike, what the boundary options were. So I was pretty much confident about how I could go through [the innings].”
The confidence showed. Arriving at 11 for 1, Gaikwad shared 195 with Virat Kohli, who completed his own second century in as many games. Watching Kohli from 22 yards proved a lesson as much as a privilege.
“I have been able to witness him since last one week now,” Gaikwad said. “Whatever practice sessions we have had, he is batting unbelievably well… the amount of time he has and how he is able to convert it in the match as well. And even this game, I enjoyed a lot. [But] mostly, I was trying to be in my zone and not really think about how he is batting or how he is able to score runs.”
India still finished 15-odd short of the par score on a surface offering occasional grip. South Africa chased with six balls to spare, Heinrich Klaasen steering them home. The defeat left India 2-0 down with one to play, the series already gone – a reminder that shiny personal numbers only matter so much.
“The chat in between was very clear. We had set 5-5-, 10-10-run target and [discussed] how to manoeuvre the gaps or how to hit those boundaries, how we can rotate strike,” Gaikwad explained of the Kohli partnership. “So the chat was around that. I think we had really good running between the wickets as well. Obviously, you dream of these kinds of moments and to be able to have that kind of partnership, I really enjoyed a lot.”
For selectors, the innings poses an agreeable dilemma. Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill remain entrenched in the opening slots, Yashasvi Jaiswal waits in the wings, and Iyer is expected back before the next ODI assignment. Gaikwad, though, has forced his name back into the middle-order debate by displaying a different gear.
“I think all these things are better if you don’t think too much [about them]. Because [if you do so], you are not in the present, and whatever matches are in front of you, you don’t have that much focus and preparation for them,” he said when asked about selection traffic.
Selection talk aside, the knock gave India’s think-tank a glimpse of flexibility it has occasionally lacked. The domestic season showed Gaikwad in patchy form – just 194 runs in the Vijay Hazare Trophy – yet the work between tournaments, often unseen net hours at Chepauk and Pune, appears to have clicked.
“It was just a matter of how I could play my first 10-15 balls and after that, the process remains the same. I have been working really hard, and obviously been in good touch as well. So I wanted to make sure that whenever I am set, I make it a big one.”
A big one it was, even if the result went the other way. The challenge now is to stack similar contributions, preferably in winning causes, before the calendar tightens towards the next ICC cycle. For India, a middle order that has occasionally looked brittle might just have gained a steady hand; for Gaikwad, the simple aim is to keep scoring wherever his name appears on the team sheet.
