Sudharsan makes it count with a touch of style

Manchester: It’s safe to assume Sai Sudharsan would have walked in with immense pressure when he took strike at one drop on the opening day of the fourth Test against England. Yes, every young batter feels a sort of squeeze early on in his career, but the weight on the 23-year-old’s shoulders must have been heavier.

The Tamil Nadu batter, who was the star of this year’s IPL by winning the Orange Cap for most runs (759) as well as the Emerging Player of the Season, had a forgettable start to his Test career in the series-opening game at Headingley when he fell for a four-ball duck in the first innings and made just 30 in the second. In both innings, he got out to innocuous balls, and India dropped him for the next two games, promoting Karun Nair to the No. 3 position.

At that stage, it looked like the youngster, who has been touted as the one for the future for the style, skill and substance he possesses, may have to wait for his time a little longer after squandering the golden opportunity that came his way. But a chance was presented to him in the fourth Test at Old Trafford as India axed Karun Nair, who wasn’t able to lock his place in the three games he played.

Sudharsan, who possibly was told about his selection in the build-up to the game, came prepared. On the eve of the game, the southpaw was visualising the shots he would play bare feet on the covers with puddles of water on them. He spent a fair amount of time shadow playing the pulls, the cuts, the drives and even the ramp shots. After each attempt, he looked at the stands in the direction where the ball intended to go. Sudharsan, by his own admission, likes to do it before most games to calm himself, and that composure was visible in his 61 off 151 balls.

Ben Stokes, sensing a weakness with shots down the leg-side, kept testing him constantly and almost got him out on 20. He survived that scare, but before and after that, he showed why there has been so much buzz about him as the future of the Indian batting. The drives on the off-side oozed of lazy elegance, while the pulls and cuts were loaded with power. Then his defence was rock solid, watching the ball right till the end and dead-batting everything.

“To be honest, I'm not looking at it as pressure,” said Sudharsan on whether he felt more pressure during his debut game or the second Test. “It's a great opportunity for me to go out there and express myself. So, I'm not looking at it as pressure. Yes, the game is all about pressure and handling it really well. So, I'm trying to play the situation very well and do what I can best for my team. The most important thing, which is right up in my mind, is rather than me playing my first Test or rather than me playing in place of another batter, I'm trying to do my best when I get in there.”

Sudharsan handled pressure very well right until he threw his wicket away in a rush of blood. Stokes preyed on his ego, and Sudharsan fell for it. It’s still early days, and the Tamil Nadu cricketer should learn from his mistakes.