Ever since he broke out in the IPL Scene, Sanju Samson has been one of those cricketers who are always close to getting into the Indian setup, but never actually make it. For years and years, it felt as if Sanju Samson was following the path of Parthiv Patel’s or the Ambati Rayudu’s. But his theatrics on Saturday night against neighbours Bangladesh have suddenly put him in the conversation for being India’s T20I opener ahead of the likes of Abhishek Sharma, Ruturaj Gaikwad and Ishan Kishan.
For many seasons of the IPL now, Sanju Samson has seemed to step up for Rajasthan Royals even captaining the side in the last 4 IPL seasons. The team under his captaincy has performed quite well regularly reaching the Playoffs and twice reaching the Finals of the IPL once losing out on the coveted trophy in 2024 against the Gujarat Titans who were in an outstanding run of form the entire season.
But when it comes to performing for India, Sanju Samson hasn’t quite stepped up for the Men In Blue. But all of that changed yesterday when one of South India’s own, scored a magnificent 111 runs in just 47 balls to power the Indian team to a total close to 300! In a T20! game, that’s absolutely nuts!
India Breaks Records ft. Sanju Samson and co.
At the end of the first Innings, India returned to the Pavillion having scored 297/6 falling just 3 runs short of the magical 300 mark which no team has yet scored amongst the major cricketing nations in a T20 game. The 297 runs scored by India are now world records in cricket. But while Sanju Samson without any doubt was the main orchestrator of this massacre of the Bangladeshi attack, he wasn’t the only one responsible for the mammoth total.
Along with him were his teammates Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya, Rinku Singh and Riyan Parag who made impactful contributions to India’s batting on the night. India’s T20I skipper scored 75 off 35 at a strike rate of 214.29, while Hardik Pandya who was later adjudged as the Player Of The Series scored 47 off just 18. Riyan Parag and Rinku Singh both made some fiery contributions with their quickfire 34(13) and 8(4) runs respectively.
Will this new-look Indian T20I side, in this new-age of T20I become the first team out of the major cricketing nations to breach the 300 T20I runs mark in a single innings? Let us know in the comments below.
