Hemang Badani. As soon as someone hear the name, one thing comes in their mind is the brilliantly paced century against Australia in March, 2001.
100 of 98 balls in the score of 248 with 10 fours and 2 sixes. Now this is what we call an ideal innings, a perfectly paced innings.
India lost that match but Badani was a household name, as any batsman scoring hundred against Australia means he have it in him to make it significant.
But Badani didn’t play that long for India. He played in 40 ODIS scoring one hundred and 4 50s. But if you see his record of 40 ODIs, he made runs in nearly every match. He got run out several times too, 4-5 times in 40 innings and around 5 innings, he remain not out. He was known to remain not out to take India home.
Not known to many, Hemang Badani was a great fielder too and he was appointed Sunrisers Hyderabad fielding coach and talent scout in 2021.
So one question hover to everyone’s head is why Hemang Badani played long for India?
Well he did play for 40 ODIS, and for a batsman to make it to the playing 11 of India and play 40 ODIs is itself a big achievement but there were some other factors too on why Badani didn’t play for that long, long means more than 4 years.
Yuvraj Singh debuted for India some months after Badani and there were other players too India was giving chances too like Dinesh Mongia who played in World cup 2003. Badani didn’t play in 2003 world cup but he did play some matches after World cup in 2004.
The rest was done by him joining ICL ( Indian cricket league) and he was ruled ineligible for mainstream cricket.He quit the ICL in 2009 and made himself available for selection for the Indian Premier League, domestic cricket, and consideration for the Indian national cricket team after a one-year cooling off period.
In 2010, he was with Chennai Super kings but didn’t get his first IPL match.
He had a brief instint as coach for few years now. Beginning in 2016, with a coach of CSG in Tamilnadu Premier league, he was the fielding coach and talent scout for Sunrisers Hyderabad in 2021.
To sum it up, Badani was a proper batsman who had a good head over his shoulders. He used to pace his innings great and he used to bowl left arm too. He was a terrific fielder.
Nothing went wrong for him, but what could have helped him is maybe a few more hundred when his first hundred came in the 10th match itself against mighty Aussies.
There were some 4-5 runouts too, and then to make a permanent place as a batsman you have to be very best. Also sometimes its about combination. Dinesh Mongia also debuted around the same time. He played around 57 ODIs too. Yuvraj debuted around same time and Kaif debuted a year ago, the combination saw Badani played 40 ODIs for India.
Badani is now 46 years old and with a calm mind and good cricketing experience, he can be the selector for team India or may come in some coaching position in years to come. He will surely excel in whatever role will be given to him.
