Vaibhav Sooryavanshi is unstoppable in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL). After ending last year on a high, the Rajasthan Royals opener continues in the same vein, giving the likes of Abhishek Sharma, Virat Kohli, Sanju Samson and others a chance to take the race for the Orange Cap in IPL 2026.
Sooryavanshi, who has already plundered the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Josh Hazlewood, Jofra Archer and many others, showed again on Saturday why he is so highly rated in a short space of time when he smashed a 36-ball hundred in Jaipur against the Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium – the ground where he scored his maiden feat last year.
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Such was his impact that several former cricketers even asked the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to fast-track the 15-year-old in the Indian senior team’s dressing room. For the inexperienced Australian and Sunrisers Hyderabad captain, Pat Cummins called Sooryavanshi his “new favorite player”.
Amidst all this, former West Indies all-rounder Carlos Brathwaite thought differently about Sooryavanshi. Instead of rushing the Rajasthan Royals opener to the Indian team, Brathwaite wants Sooryavanshi to get the pressure and atmosphere at the top level before handing him his debut cap for the senior Indian team.
Brathwaite, the hero of West Indies’ 2016 T20 World Cup-winning campaign, rather wants Sooryavanshi to be treated like the legendary Brian Lara on his first day. Like Sooryavanshi, Lara was touted as the next big thing in the West Indies long before his debut. As a result, Lara was forced to spend time with legends such as Sir Viv Richards and others.
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“I’m sorry Vaibhave, but if you look at the way West Indies treated Brian Lara,” Braithwaite told ESPNcricinfo. “He was a generational talent, everyone knew. So what did the West Indies do? They put him in the mix with Viv Richards and whatnot, but he didn’t play international cricket.”
“It was a different time with a lot of tour matches and he was cutting his teeth with senior players without making his debut. So maybe there is the best of both worlds – where you can have him with the Indian team – learning from Virat Kohli, learning from Rohit Sharma, learning from Suryakumar Yadav.
“There are younger players who are close to him in age that he can learn from before just throwing him in at the deep end,” added Braithwaite. Interestingly, Lara is one of Sooryavanshi’s two idols.
Lots of entries for Vaibhav Sooryavanshi
His 36-ball hundred against Sunrisers Hyderabad was the third fastest century in IPL history. Chris Gayle holds the record for the fastest ton in the competition’s history with a 30-ball 100. Sooryavanshi himself broke the second fastest and fastest by an Indian last year against Gujarat Titans when he reached the three-figure mark in just 35 balls.
Sooryavanshi, who opened the match with 955 runs in 25 T20 matches, became the youngest player to score 1000 runs in T20 cricket at the age of 15 years and 29 days. He holds the record for the youngest player to feature in a T20 match and also the youngest to score a century in a T20.
It was Sooryavanshi’s fourth T20 hundred in his 26th match, making him the fastest to the mark. Next on the list are Usman Khan (33 matches), B Sai Sudharsan (72), Chris Gayle (77) and Michael Klinger (88).
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