Chhotu. That’s his nickname in the Mumbai changing room. In fact, in most teams he has been a part of over the last dozen years, from the Rizvi Springfield school team to India A, he has always been the youngest. As he lifted the coveted Under-19 World Cup trophy aloft in celebration on Saturday, Prithvi Shaw appeared to have grown in stature: Chhotu had gone from being the youngest to one of the bigger achievers in city cricket.
That Shaw, the first Mumbai cricketer to be appointed India Under-19 captain for a World Cup, ended his junior cricket journey on a memorable note not only augurs well for the 18-year-old, it also indicates that Mumbai's legacy of batsmanship has found a new torch-bearer.
Pravin Amre, who heads the Mumbai Cricket Association's Cricket Improvement Committee, said, “To be honest, for any State, under-19 cricket is critical. It’s heartening to see an u-19 boy doing well and displaying such leadership qualities. He had a very good first-class season, which firmed up our belief that he can play at higher levels for many more years. The key is to handle him properly now.”
The Virar Volcano
Chhotu may have landed himself a massive eight-figure IPL contract and lifted the junior cricket World Cup in just one week, but his journey as Prithvi Shaw, from a distant West Mumbai suburb to being the toast of city cricket’s finest, or Indian cricket, for that matter, warrants telling.
When he was barely four years old, his father Pankaj, a smalltime cloth merchant in Virar, noticed the spark in him. Whenever he would bat at the local municipal ground, a crowd would collect to watch him in action. His first coach, Santosh Pingulkar, advised Pankaj to expose Prithvi to the big league at the earliest.
His father’s nod began years of two-hour local train rides, beginning in Virar at 4 a.m. and ending in Bandra, where Prithvi would practice at the MIG Club. When he was in Class III, his father took him to Raju Pathak, coach of champion school team Rizvi Springfield. “He was barely as tall as the stumps. I wanted to start him off in the nets for smaller kids, but he became upset and said he wanted to bat against the older boys. I put my foot down, but after watching him deal with the first two balls he faced, I sent him in the older boys’ nets,” says Pathak. “Since then, he has been plundering runs against bowlers usually much older to him.”
Into the limelight
Prithvi’s first brush with fame was when he scored a record 546 runs in a Harris Shield match in November 2013. The innings gave him the reputation of someone who scores big hundreds on big occasions. True to expectation, he scored a ton on his first-class debut, the 2016-17 Ranji Trophy semifinal, and repeated that performance in his Duleep Trophy debut.
Amre said, “Few u-19 cricketers can stake a claim for place in Mumbai's Ranji side at that young age, but Prithvi has earned it, and has shown that he belongs in the big league.”
Mumbai chief selector Ajit Agarkar says Prithvi’s success is also proof that Mumbai’s batting future is in safe hands. “We haven’t had a great season, particularly in the bowling department. but Prithvi has been one of the brightest spots. I’m sure the World Cup success will boost his confidence and help other budding batting talent as well.”
Prithvi, who likes to celebrate a big hundred with Chinese food, preferably chowmein, was not satisfied with his performance in Mumbai’s topsy-turvy Ranji campaign, despite scoring three centuries.“I think I could have done more,” he had told The Hindu soon after his team’s quarter-final exit. Now, the sky seems to be the limit.
