Shubman Gill and Gautam Gambhir will have to make a forced change for the India vs New Zealand 2nd ODI. Despite an all-round performance against New Zealand in Vadodara, the Men in Blue will have to change the middle order. After Washington Sundar sustained a side strain, someone will have to fill his boots.
Considering Washington provided a perfect balance, it’ll have to be an all-rounder. That eliminates three of the five candidates. One of Nitish Kumar Reddy, whose exclusion left few scratching their heads or Ayush Badoni, who the BCCI has named as Washington’s replacement, will come into the team.
Nitish Reddy to return?
Nitish already has experience of playing international cricket. He made his ODI debut just 3 months ago in India. His List A numbers aren’t that impressive. But his recent performance in the 2025-26 Vijay Hazare Trophy (VHT), especially with the ball, has been impressive.
He’s picked 6 wickets in 5 matches and has been batting at numbers four and five. Considering Washington was supposed to bat at five or six. Nitish slots in perfectly. He isn’t expected to bowl 10 overs per game either.
But there might be two issues. Nitish usually takes the new ball for Andhra, which can’t happen for India with Mohammed Siraj and Harshit Rana taking the powerplay duties. Furthermore, the pitch in Rajkot could aid spinners more than pacers, which will reduce his output.
ODI debut for Ayush Badoni?
That brings us to Badoni. He’s a like-for-like replacement for Washington. The 26-year-old has been working on his bowling for a little while and has turned himself into an all-rounder for Delhi. In the ongoing VHT, Badoni has batted just thrice. All of these innings have come at number six, a spot that’s available with KL Rahul slotted at 5.
As mentioned above, spin could play a role in Rajkot. One can’t forget that Washington had bowled 5 overs by the time he was injured. New Zealand has several lefties in the side, and Badoni can be used as a matchup bowler against them. He’s delivered 22 overs for Delhi in VHT and has taken 4 wickets with an economy of 3.59.
He can finish the innings. Badoni’s done that for Delhi and the Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) in the Indian Premier League (IPL). One can argue that Nitish has a higher ceiling than Badoni and needs to be groomed. But if we are talking about today, Badoni provides more balance and utility to the side.
Predicted India Playing XI for 2nd New Zealand ODI
Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill (c), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer (vc), KL Rahul(w), Ravindra Jadeja, Ayush Badoni, Harshit Rana, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna
Bench: Nitish Kumar Reddy, Arshdeep Singh, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel (wk)
Cricket
Predicted India Playing XI for 2nd ODI vs NZ: Nitish Reddy or Ayush Badoni, who'll replace Sundar?
