5 Debutant Cricketers Who Were Lucky Charms For Their National Team: Making a debut for your country is a special and memorable day that every cricketer cherishes. The player is under the pressure in his maiden international match and series, but always looks to perform at his best.
There have been a few instances when a debutant player has proved to be a lucky charm for his national side as his team then went on to win many matches after his debut.
Here are 5 debutant players who proved to be lucky charms for their country in international cricket:
Deepak Hooda
Deepak Hooda has enjoyed great success at the start of his India career. He made his debut in both the white-ball formats in February 2022 and has so far played in 14 ODI+T20I matches. He slammed a century vs Ireland and was impressive vs England and West Indies, which saw him being named in the 15-man squad for the Asia Cup 2022.
Hooda’s debut brought India a great amount of success: in the 14 matches Hooda has played, India have not lost a single game!! Yes – whether it’s home or away, whether it’s England, West Indies, Sri Lanka and Ireland, India have won all the games so far in which Deepak Hooda has played.
Manish Pandey
Manish Pandey made his India debut in 2015 and has featured in 29 ODIs and 39 T20Is in his career, the last of which came in July 2021. He has been in and out of the national team in this period, but proved to be a lucky charm for India – out of the 68 international matches Pandey featured in, India lost only 15 games, while winning 52 and one was tied. Talk about lucky charm, eh..
Now the most astonishing part in this: starting from 8 March 2018 to 2 Feb 2020, in the games Pandey was involved in, India went unbeaten in 22 (ODI+T20I) matches – this includes one tied ODI vs Afghanistan and two tied T20Is vs New Zealand, both which India won in Super Over.
Satvik Nadigotla
Satvik Nadigotla is a 33-year-old Romanian batsman who made his Romania T20I debut in 2019 and has so far played 18 T20Is. While his individual numbers are mediocre – 199 runs at an average of 15 and strike rate of 121 – what is striking is that Romania have lost only 2 out of the 18 matches that Satvik played while winning the rest 16. In fact, Romania had won 15 matches on a trot since in which Satvik played from his debut.
David Miller
One of the most dangerous white-ball batsmen, David Miller‘s debut in 2010 brought South Africa immense fortunes as they won 13 consecutive matches in which the left-hander played since his debut. The Proteas defeated the likes of West Indies, Zimbabwe and Pakistan in both the white-ball formats during those 13 wins.
Shantanu Vashisht
Another Romanian player in this list is Shantanu Vashisht, the 33-year-old pacer who has played 17 T20Is for Romania and picked up 16 wickets at an impressive economy rate of 5.52. Since the game Shantanu made his debut, in August 2019, Romania went on a winning spree of 13 consecutive games in which he played.
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