B. Sai Sudharsan has been in a rich vein of form over the last few months. The Gujarat Titans opener had a 700-plus run season for the second IPL edition in succession and finished as the league’s third-highest scorer (722 runs).
“It was my best IPL so far,” Sai Sudharsan told Sports stars. “I didn’t score much in the first few games. I won’t say it was challenging; it was interesting, where the belief, trust and everything increased day by day rather than me becoming doubtful.
“When you are scoring, it is easier to believe in yourself. But when you don’t, are you still trusting the process? Mentally, are you still thinking about not scoring in the previous match? So, in those ways, I learnt a lot — to not take the past into a game,” he added.
The Tamil Nadu batter made his Test debut in England last year and has had an up-and-down start to his fledgling career in whites. But, he felt that it had taught him valuable lessons.
“In Tests, even a small weakness will be challenged. As a batter, you have to keep improving in all those small things. At the same time, there is not much time to do so.
You have to be smart enough to pick things and evolve,” the 24-year-old remarked.
“I feel it is all about owning that place. I could have owned it a bit more and been a bit freer (in my approach). The more I do that, the more I can bring out the best version of myself. A little bit of that happened during the Afghanistan Test match.”
Post IPL, Sai Sudharsan seamlessly transitioned into red-ball cricket with an 81 against Afghanistan in the one-off Test before striking two centuries for India-A in the recent tour of Sri Lanka.
Considering India is set to travel to the island nation for a two-Test series next month, he couldn’t have asked for better preparation.“Because of the strong breeze, the line of the ball changes quite a lot. Experiencing that was really valuable. You can’t commit too early and judge the line and length. You have to judge the ball as late as possible,” he explained about the things he picked up in the two India-A matches.
Even as he looks towards less hectic weeks, when he will appear in a few TNCA first division league games, Sai Sudharsan has identified the areas to work on.
“The first is from a physical perspective. I want to become stronger, leaner and fitter in terms of my movement and recovery. I want to continue fine-tuning my game against spin and understanding my footwork for the challenges ahead,” he said before signing off.
