{"id":9917,"date":"2025-12-06T15:16:27","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T09:46:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/?p=668289"},"modified":"2025-12-06T15:16:27","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T09:46:27","slug":"ind-vs-sa-3rd-odi-why-aiden-markram-did-not-open-despite-scoring-a-century-in-the-last-match","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/cricket\/ind-vs-sa-3rd-odi-why-aiden-markram-did-not-open-despite-scoring-a-century-in-the-last-match\/","title":{"rendered":"IND vs SA 3rd ODI: Why Aiden Markram did not open despite scoring a century in the last match"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-start=\"207\" data-end=\"477\">Aiden Markram smashed a brilliant 110 in the 2nd ODI at Raipur \u2014 his maiden ODI hundred as an opener \u2014 yet he did <strong data-start=\"321\" data-end=\"328\">not<\/strong> walk out to open in the 3rd ODI at Visakhapatnam. Instead, South Africa continued with <strong data-start=\"416\" data-end=\"454\">Quinton de Kock and Ryan Rickelton<\/strong> as their opening pair.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"479\" data-end=\"528\">There are two clear reasons behind this decision:<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"530\" data-end=\"863\"><strong data-start=\"530\" data-end=\"598\">1. The team wanted to give Ryan Rickelton the opening slot again<\/strong><br data-start=\"598\" data-end=\"601\" \/>Rickelton was drafted back into the XI and South Africa seemed keen to provide him continuity at the top. The management appears to be backing him to settle as an opener, and giving him that space meant Markram had to move down to his more familiar No. 3\/4 role.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"865\" data-end=\"1267\"><strong data-start=\"865\" data-end=\"950\">2. Markram adapted as a senior batter \u2014 similar to how KL Rahul adjusts for India<\/strong><br data-start=\"950\" data-end=\"953\" \/>Just like India often reshuffle KL Rahul based on team balance, Markram \u2014 as a senior player \u2014 has the flexibility to adjust his batting position. He has spent most of his ODI career in the middle order, and despite scoring a century as an opener, he returned to his usual slot to accommodate the team combination.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1269\" data-end=\"1446\">Markram\u2019s versatility is one of South Africa\u2019s biggest strengths in this series, allowing the management to structure the lineup around form players like Rickelton and Breetzke.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1448\" data-end=\"1564\">At 25 overs, South Africa stood at <strong data-start=\"1483\" data-end=\"1492\">143\/2<\/strong>, with de Kock dominating on 84* and Breetzke settling in alongside him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Aiden Markram smashed a brilliant 110 in the 2nd ODI at Raipur \u2014 his maiden ODI hundred as an opener\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":250,"featured_media":32441,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cricket"],"reading_time":"2 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}