da realsbet： Time and again at the business end of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, this 21-year-old rode the pressure, read the bowler, and executed with flair to take Mumbai across the line

da betway： Himanshu Agrawal16-Dec-2024Twenty-one-year-old Suryansh Shedge seems to have as much clarity when he speaks as he does when he bats.For instance, let’s look at the quarter-final of the recent Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT). Shedge, batting at No. 6 for Mumbai against Vidarbha, is under pressure. His team needs another 60 runs to win off just 24 balls, and he has started with just three runs off as many deliveries. Five of his six innings before this have yielded 1*, 0, 9, 12 and 1* (the other yielded 30* off eight, but more on that later).Here, with Mumbai’s tournament on the line, Shedge despatches offspinner Mandar Mahale for a four and three sixes in a 24-run over. Each time, he is deep in the crease and across the stumps. He finishes with 36* from 12 balls. He had been told coming into the competition that he would be batting at Nos. 5 or 6, and so he had trained for just this situation: teeing off to turn the game around quickly – in one over, specifically.Related

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“Coming into this tournament, I tweaked my practice sessions a bit. I was playing six-ball sets, [and] trying to score a certain amount of runs in those six balls,” Shedge told reporters. “That kind of helps you. And I was taking breaks after every six balls because when you go into bat, you will only get 10-15 balls to face. I was trying to simulate that in the practice sessions, and that helps. When you practise going from ball one, it kind of becomes a muscle memory, and when you are in the middle, you find it easier.”Shedge often arrives to bat in tricky situations, and has made it a habit to boss the game from there. He wrapped up the match against Vidarbha by sending the ball out on to the road in Alur. Six days earlier, in the first of his string of good performances at the business end the SMAT, he had crashed that 30* off eight balls, this knock aiding a tournament record chase of 230 against Andhra. In the semi-final, against Baroda, Shedge faced only one ball in the chase of 159, but even that landed in the stands.”I’ve always batted like this. Even in my Under-16 days, [when] I was playing [multi-]days games, I’ve scored 196 in 115 balls,” he said. “So if I see the ball, I hit it. And you might make errors when you play in that fashion, so you have to be level-headed to come back from the errors you make. It requires a lot of strength.”Suryansh Shedge got the job done for Mumbai in the SMAT final•Himanshu Agrawal/ESPNcricinfoLevel-headedness. As a finisher, that is one quality which separates the good from the best. Shedge has looked good already. Six of his nine innings at the SMAT were at No. 6. One came at No. 7, in the most important match of the tournament: the final, against Madhya Pradesh.The game could have gone either way when he walked out, with Mumbai 46 runs away, with 32 balls and five wickets in hand. Suryakumar Yadav, Ajinkya Rahane, Shreyas Iyer, Prithvi Shaw and Shivam Dube were out. But third ball he faced, Shedge stood tall facing up to a dipping full toss and swiped it for four to deep square-leg. Three balls later, Shedge shifted his weight on to the back foot and guided a length ball for four past the wicketkeeper. His partner Atharva Ankolekar cracked a six last ball of that over and, just like that, Mumbai were favourites to seal the title, which they did, Shedge remaining unbeaten – again – on 36 off 15.

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It took Shedge “a lot of hours” with coaches Abhishek Nayar, Monty Desai and Manish Bangera to build up his awareness and power-hitting.”You gain a lot of perspective when you spend time with them. Rather than practicing, you talk to them a lot. At the end of the day, when you go out and you need a certain amount of runs in certain balls, it all comes down to your mental game,” Shedge said. “So how positive you are, it signifies a lot. And hard work over anything. I have put in a lot of hard yards; so have my parents and people who are my well-wishers. Practicing, I wouldn’t say it makes you perfect. But trying to practice perfectly makes you perfect.”As Mumbai edged closer to the title, Shedge brought out the cherries to top the cake, swatting a short-of-a-length ball outside off from Venkatesh Iyer over deep midwicket and then – in SKY mode – exposing all his stumps and sweeping a full ball around seventh stump into the top tier over fine leg. He said he took inputs from Suryakumar , and that certainly showed.

“Before the bowler is in the run-up, I don’t think of any shots. When he starts running, then my brain starts working. And then I just commit. There are no second thoughts in my head.”Suryansh Shedge

“I saw two fielders [inside the circle] behind [square], and he bowled a wide ball [outside off]. I knew he was going to back that ball. So all I needed to do was get into position, and time it,” Shedge said of that sweep for six. “If you react a bit early, he might see you and go further away from you. So as soon as he was going to release the ball, I came into the position and that happened.”Before the bowler is in the run-up, I don’t think of any shots. When he starts running, then my brain starts working. And then I just commit. There are no second thoughts in my head.”All this points to a lot of maturity, a quality that would have been especially useful when, last year, Shedge had to deal with a stress fracture in the L4 region of his spine. The injury was a double blow: it ruled him out of SMAT 2023-24, and because of it, Lucknow Super Giants (LSG), his IPL franchise, released him.It got to him, but then his competitive streak kicked in. “First two months [after the injury], I was just going through the motions. I wasn’t in the zone, but I kind of got out… But me as a person, personally, I like competition. And I like pressure because it tests me. At the end of the day, when my head hits the pillow, I want to feel that satisfaction of doing something for the team in whatever department it may be.”Now he can tick impressing at the SMAT off his list, with 131 runs at a strike rate of 251.92 – the highest strike rate for anyone who faced 20 or more balls this season. And soon enough, he’ll have another go at the IPL, this time with Punjab Kings, where he will also have his Mumbai captain Shreyas Iyer for company. For now, though, celebrating his team’s SMAT triumph will take centre stage.