Aakash Chopra On Nitish Reddy Uncapped Status: Former Indian cricketer and now broadcaster Aakash Chopra has said that Indian Premier League franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad will be praying that their young star all-rounder Nitish Kumar Reddy remains uncapped before the retentions for IPL 2025 are locked in.
Reddy, who is a batting all-rounder from Andhra Pradesh, burst onto the scene in IPL 2024. He played 13 matches for the franchise this season, scoring 303 runs at an average of 33.67 and a strike rate of 142.92. The 21-year-old even took three wickets with his right-arm medium-pace bowling. These performances resulted in him winning the ‘Emerging Player of the Season’ award.
The 2025 season of the IPL will be preceded by a mega-auction, for which the BCCI has released new rules and guidelines. Most importantly, the teams can retain or RTM (Right to Match) up to six players from their current squad. A team like SRH, which reached the final in 2024 and had a spectacular tournament, would want to keep a hold of most players they can from their current team.
The player retained first would be paid at least Rs. 18 crore, second would be paid 12 crore, and third 11 crore. If the team is to retain a fourth and a fifth player, they can do so for Rs. 18 crore and 14 crore, respectively. And while they can retain a maximum of five capped players, they can also retain a maximum of two uncapped players, only one if they have kept five uncapped named for a total of six.
An uncapped player, for those who don’t know, is a player who has not played a game for his national team. This distinction, as a player represents his national side, will change.
Nitish Reddy is currently an uncapped player. But he has been picked in the Indian Cricket Team squad for the three-match T20I series against Bangladesh. Starting on October 6. If he plays even a single game in that series, he will become a capped player and would hence have to be retained as such by SRH.
But with the likes of Hardik Pandya and Shivam Dube in the side, the chances of Reddy playing a game are slim, but not zero.
Aakash Chopra On Nitish Reddy Uncapped Status
In a recent video released on his YouTube channel, Aakash Chopra claimed that Sunrisers Hyderabad would be praying that Nitish Kumar Reddy does not play a game in the upcoming T20I series, saying,
“They would be praying that Nitish Kumar Reddy remains uncapped. They would be saying, ‘Please don’t play him in the T20I series.’ Just like Harshit Rana, his name is also there in that team, and if he gets a chance to play, he will also become capped.”
Aakash further explained why this is a huge issue for the Sunrisers. The franchise, having done so well in 2024, had several capped players do well for them, players they would want to retain ahead of Reddy.
“They have to firstly retain the captain (Pat Cummins) and Abhishek Sharma. You have to retain Heinrich Klaasen, and it’s great if you can get Travis Head. These four names come to my mind, to begin with. Pat Cummins, since he is the captain and he managed the team very well, you will want to retain him,” said Chopra.
A similar problem stands in front of IPL 2024 champions Kolkata Knight Riders, whose new pace-bowling sensation Harshit Rana is in the squad for the Bangladesh series as well.
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