The numbers are staggering enough. Age: 19, First Class matches: 9, runs: 1089, average: 77.78, strike rate: 77.28, hundreds: 3, fifties: 7, highest: 268.
But numbers often don’t tell the whole story.
They don’t tell you what a delight it is to watch Shubman Gill make those runs. Or how good his technique is, or how unflappable his temperament is.
Just watch him bat in the nets, you will realise the Punjab opener is special. Like Amol Muzumdar did, one morning three years ago at the National Cricket Academy in Bengaluru.
“I was working with the Under-19 boys then,” says the former Mumbai run-machine. “I saw him bat in the nets for five minutes… I knew I was watching someone special.”
Rajdeep Kalsi, Punjab’s cricket manager, had watched Gill much earlier, in 2013. “I was in charge of the Himachal Pradesh under-16 team, so Shubman was playing for the rival side, and I still remember how he belied his age with his batting,” says the veteran coach. “He was even more aggressive then, and has matured as a batsman very fast.”
Kalsi is glad that Gill now is part of his team. On the eve of Punjab’s Ranji Trophy match against Kerala at Mohali last month, he had made an interesting statement. “I am afraid we won’t have his services for long,” he had said.
His words have come true, sooner than he anticipated. Gill has replaced K.L. Rahul in India’s ODI and T20I squads for the New Zealand tour.
Gill’s graduation to the senior team may have been hastened by the fallout from a talk show featuring Rahul and Hardik Pandya, but it was always going to be a question of when, not if. The teenager himself had been waiting for that call from the national selectors.
“I am ready for international cricket,” he told The Hindu after another lovely knock from him had steered Punjab to a 10-wicket win over Kerala at the PCA Stadium. “I can take big challenges now.”
Much of his batting is built on that self-confidence. No stage is intimidating for him.
And you do not get many bigger stages than the IPL, especially when you are just 18. Last year, he made his debut at the world’s most glamorous cricket league count.
“Playing in the IPL was my dream, but I saw it only as a part of my journey,” Gill says. “I wasn’t overawed by the atmosphere of the IPL; my only worry was that I had never played much T20 in my life, not even in the Syed Mushtaq Ali tournament.”
Yet, playing for Kolkata Knight Riders, he made 203 runs from 13 matches at an average of 33.83 and a strike rate of 146.04. The unbeaten 57 off 36 balls against Chennai Super Kings was further proof of his temperament and shot-making abilities.
It was his heroics at the Under-19 World Cup in New Zealand that caught the eye of IPL talent scouts. He scored 372 runs at an average of 124 to star in India’s triumph. He was named the Player of the Tournament.
“That was a turning point in my career,” he says. “Everyone got to know who Shubman Gill was.”
This season he has been letting the world know how good he is. After scoring 268 off 328 balls against Tamil Nadu at Mohali, he made a scintillating 148 off 154 balls that almost pulled off an unlikely victory in Hyderabad.
Muzumdar was at both those matches as a commentator. “The knock against Hyderabad is one of the finest I have seen in First Class cricket in recent times,” he says. “I feel Gill’s batting is mostly about temperament and technique.”
And timing, you might add. He seems to have more time to play the ball than most batsmen of his age.
“I haven’t seen many batsmen time the ball as well as Gill does since Sourav Ganguly,” says Kalsi. “The ball just leaves his bat all the way to the boundary. Another thing I have noticed about his batting is the head position; it is just perfect.”
Gill’s pursuit of perfection began very early. “I was just three or four years old when my father (Lakhwinder Singh) started training me as a batsman,” he says. “In my village of Chak Khere Wala, in Fazilka district, he would make me practise against fast bowlers, and that has helped me evolve as a batsman.”
That he was a prodigy was pretty evident, even to his contemporaries. “We all felt he was a level ahead of us,” says Jaish Jain, a Punjab under-19 batsman. “I am not at all surprised by the success he has had. He is an inspiration for us.”
As for Gill, he is motivated by the ease with which his World Cup captain Prithvi Shaw has transitioned to the Test level. “I felt if he could, I too could,” he says.
Could Shaw and Gill open together for India one day? That is an intriguing thought.
