Look, I get it. I know many Aussie cricket fans are pretty sceptical when it comes to the IPL.
‘It’s not real cricket’, they say. ‘It’s ruining the game’. I understand those feelings. I used to be sceptical about the league myself, and there are still parts of it I’m critical of.
But what’s floored me is seeing people today say that they are uninterested in the incredible 35-ball century by 14-year-old Vaibhav Suryavanshi overnight. That just doesn’t sound rational to me.
It’s one thing to resent the power India has in cricket and to not like T20, and to be cynical about the confected nature of domestic T20 leagues — of which the IPL is the biggest — and of the small boundaries, the big bats, and the commentators being contractually bound not to be too critical.
But putting all that aside, surely when a 14-year-old smashes grown men everywhere and scores 100 off 35 balls, that should cut through all the negativity and pique your interest.
I mean, he’s 14! As everyone is saying, ‘What were you doing at 14?’
Me personally, I was playing touch football at lunch on asphalt basketball courts and on Saturdays being intimidated by the ‘lethal’ bowlers in my local under 16B competition.
This kid, on the other hand, is earning $200k (Aussie) for his IPL stint and just hit seven fours and ELEVEN sixes on his way to a 35-ball century (he was ultimately out for 101 off 38).
And it wasn’t as though it was a weak attack. The Gujarat Titans bowling lineup that Suryavanshi slaughtered included Rashid Khan, arguably the greatest T20 bowler of all time, Prasidh Krishna, who has been the best fast bowler in this year’s IPL and Mohammed Siraj, an Indian Test star who has been bowling with rejuvenated vigour this season.
He also took down Test veteran, Ishant Sharma. You might remember a young Ishant Sharma causing Ricky Ponting all sorts of troubles in a Test match in Perth. Well, that was in 2008, three years before Suryavanshi was even born!
The bloke I feel sorriest for is Karim Janat, a 26-year-old medium paced all rounder from Afghanistan. He was making his IPL debut but what should have been possibly the greatest night of his life was a train wreck.
He had the misfortune to bowl what proved to be his solitary over to Suryavanshi. The result? 646446. It reads like a tennis score! 30 runs – take your hat and have a rest mate, you’re done for the night!
Watch the highlights of the innings if you get a chance: it’s stunning stuff. Sure, not everything comes off the middle of the bat, but nor did it when Ian Botham scored his famous 149 against Australia in 1981 to win an unwinnable Test match, the one in which Dennis Lillee and Rod Marsh had taken the odds of 500-1 for an England win. And just like Botham, in amongst a few edges and slices of luck were plenty of truly glorious and audacious shots.
Suryavanshi tried to hit no fewer than 26 of the 38 balls he ultimately faced to the fence. This sort of attacking intent is extraordinary, even in a game of T20 cricket.
So where to from here? A kid this good, this strong, and with this level of hand-eye coordination — it’s hard to imagine what he might achieve. Even Don Bradman, the ultimate child prodigy, at age 14, was still deciding whether he wanted to play cricket or tennis. It was only at about 17 that his true genius really started to shine through.
Have we witnessed the arrival of a new cricketing superstar? Possibly, but there’s no guarantee. This innings could be just an asterisk in cricket history. In years to come, people might say, ‘Where did that young kid go?’
After all, he is just a kid. I know there’s some scepticism about players sometimes being actually older than their quoted age, but this kid LOOKS 14 – he should be at school battling with Year Nine maths, not making world headlines.
It is an interesting and potentially confusing situation. I mean, what would happen if next game he wore one in the head at 150 kilometres per hour? All of us currently lionising him and celebrating him would surely feel quite awkward — more so than if an adult was similarly hit. Should a 14-year-old even be allowed to play against grown men? On the evidence so far, he’s not having much trouble.
Anyway, for those of you who loathe T20 cricket and loathe the Indian Premier League, that’s fair enough, although I myself don’t. I think it is fun and entertaining, and just like the NBA, it’s where the world’s best players go.
But no matter your viewpoint, I think you must agree that for a 14-year-old to hit a century off 35 balls is one of the more remarkable things you’ll see this year in any sport.
