Suryakumar Yadav's 'biggest challenge will be to be consistent in all formats': AB de Villiers

Mr 360, Ab de Villiers, someone Surya Kumar Yadav is often compared with, thinks the rising India batter showcases a wide spectrum of shots, but needs to maintain consistency across all the formats of the game.

De Villiers, in his interview on Home of Heroes on JioCinema, said, “His (Yadav’s) biggest challenge will be to be consistent in all the formats and to figure out his game in Test cricket, in ODIs and in T20 and understand how it works for him. I think he should actually just realize it’s all exactly the same. I do see a lot of similarities. He’s just going to be able to shift through the gears and I mean, it’s incredible to watch. He can score all around the ground.

“And when he’s confident, he moves so slowly and he sets it so beautifully upright. He gets the ball nice and late. And once you snap that as a batter, once you realize that the faster the bowler gets, the more you’ve got to let it come and that is really starting to click and I think he has clicked that. So, the sky’s the limit. Excuse the pun,” de Villiers added.

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SKY hogged the headlines last year after he scored three centuries in T20Is at a strike rate of over 200. He entered the top five batters with the most T20Is centuries, being the only one therein who didn’t open. The only other Indian in the club was the topper Rohit Sharma with four tons, who also happens to be an opener. Yadav was the only one to have knocked off three tons despite batting relatively down the order on number four.

While he may hold the top spot in the ICC T20Is batter list, he hasn’t had a similar experience in the ODIs and Tests. He started off his Test career earlier this year during the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, where he debuted in the game played at Nagpur. He hasn’t been picked up for a single Test ever since. In the ODI series thereabouts he had three golden ducks in a row; dismissed on the first ball he played.

Even in the upcoming tour of the West Indies, he couldn’t make the cut for the Test squad, despite there being place in the middle order in the absence of Rishabh Pant.

Yadav has been included in the ODI squad for the Windies tour, however.

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