At the Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium on Saturday, Suryakumar Yadav engineered Team India’s spectacular victory over Sri Lanka in the third and final T20I of the bilateral series. In the series finale at Rajkot, the on-song batter produced a brilliant knock to ensure that India, captained by Hardik Pandya, finished ahead of Sri Lanka. Suryakumar teamed up with opener Shubman Gill to help India get off to an exciting start in the powerplay after Rahul Tripathi’s pivotal cameo, and the two batsmen established the groundwork for a match-winning score in Rajkot.
Suryakumar stayed unbroken and blasted his third century in the shortest format of the game, missing out on Gill’s first T20I half-century but succeeding in staying unbeaten. Suryakumar’s brilliant innings of 112* off 51 balls helped India, led by Pandya, reach a huge total of 228/5 in 20 overs. At the awards event, Indian captain Pandya praised Suryakumar for his outstanding batting performance.
“I think he has been surprising everyone every innings that he is batting. He is just telling us that batting is so easy. If I were bowling to him, I’d be disheartened on seeing his batting, with the shot he plays. He has played blinders after blinders,” Pandya said. After Suryakumar guided India to a gigantic total, pacer Arshdeep Singh bagged three scalps while Yuzvendra Chahal and Umran Malik shared four wickets to bowl out Sri Lanka for 137 in 16.4 overs.
Premier batter Suryakumar was named the Player of the Match for his batting heroics. Stand-in skipper Pandya also praised Tripathi for playing a small cameo in India’s win over Sri Lanka in the series decider. The Indian all-rounder was also quizzed about giving advice to Suryakumar, who has been India’s go-to batter in the shortest format. “Special mention to Rahul Tripathi – the ball was doing something but he showed great intent. Then SKY did his thing. You don’t need to tell him anything, he knows what to do. If there is any situation where he is unsure, we have our chats but more often than not, he knows what to do,” Pandya added.
