Some players are quite lucky. They continue to get the benefit of just a couple of good performances for a long time. But there are some who remain marginalised and unnoticed despite giving good performances for a long time. Rishabh Pant belongs to the first category, while Sanju Samson falls in the second one. Sanju deserves the chance in Team India by virtue of having tremendous potential and capabilities.
Sharjah is remembered either for India-Pakistan cricket clashes of 1980s or for two stormy innings of Sachin Tendulkar in Coca-Cola Cup. Sanju Samson performed such a stormy batting that M.S. Dhoni’s CSK got demolished at Sharjah stadium in his first match of IPL’s 13th season. He played an innings of 74 runs off 34 balls which included one four and nine sixes. Samson smashed Piyush Chawla, the same leg-spinner, who had scripted the victory of CSK against Mumbai Indians by virtue of his superb bowling performance. He smashed leg-spinner Piyush Chawla for three sixes in one over and another in the other over. Similarly, Sanju Samson hit three sixes off Ravindra Jadeja, and one each off Sam Curran and Deepak Chahar.
They are all international level players whom Sanju played easily through powerhits. He partnered with skipper Steve Smith at the rate of over 200 and paved the way for Rajasthan Royals’ victory. His outstanding speciality was clean hitting with full timing. His sixes with pull, straight and over the cover shots were delight to see. That is not all, Sanju took two catches and stumped two players and became a hero of the match. Seeing this performance, Rishabh Pant was trolled on Twitter. “The BCCI put Rishabh Pant over Sanju while the latter is more talented than the former!”In other words, Sanju is the youngest player to have completed 1,000 runs in IPL. Whether it is the captaincy of Kerala Ranji team or hitting century in IPL and Champions League, he has been the youngest player to have done so. He was the first keeper-batsman to have made a double century in Vijay Hazare Trophy (One Day). Even the fastest double century of List A cricket goes to his credit.
It was not his first flamboyant and fiery innings in IPL. Last year, he had hit his second century off just 55 balls in IPL. In the same match, Sanju had scored 24 runs in one over of Bhuvaneshwar, hitting four fours, one six and two runs. If a batsman has the capacity to blast Team India’s bowlers like this, then his every innings matters. Last year, he got the reputation of being the youngest cricketer to have completed 2,000 runs in IPL. How can we forget the Champion League match that took place a few years ago when Sanju after catching Sachin Tendulkar, Rohit Sharma and Kieron Pollard behind the stumps also performed superbly before the stumps too and hit a fifty. Similarly, his innings of 60 runs off 33 balls in the final of Champions Leagues against Mumbai Indians is a memorable one.
Listing the achievements of Sanju does not mean that it is in any manner an attempt to show Rishabh Pant in poor light. Rishabh is also a talented player but now nobody will make a mistake of blindly considering him as a successor of Dhoni. The problem with Rishabh is that of his psychological condition. His performance in IPL was worthy of attention. But at the international level, his two Test centuries against England and Australia had presented a picture of his being a big player. That was also the reason why he got too many opportunities. He also impressed in some of the innings. But his consistency level was low. Now, Sanju will have to give a good performance consistently taking advantage of Pant’s weaknesses.
Obviously, it is a good indication for the future to develop healthy competition at the national level. Though the keeping of both the players is average, both of them are improving it. Let’s hope that whosoever is given a chance after this healthy competition at international level, he will improve his consistency level and will, in turn, be a successor of Dhoni in real sense.