Vaibhav Suryavanshi Is The Boy Who Brought Down Giants
The IPL's youngest player just made his loudest statement
There’s audacity, and then there’s whatever 14-year-old Vaibhav Suryavanshi was channeling when he walked out to chase 210 in Jaipur, looked Mohammed Siraj in the eye, and hit his third ball in the IPL for six. Not dabbed, not guided, not nervy. Just clean, brutal timing over long-on. It was the kind of moment that made us stop and say: wait, how old is this kid?
Its not often that a tournament like the IPL—15 years deep into its blockbuster era, teeming with stars and storylines—gets truly blindsided. But on a sticky Jaipur evening on Monday night, Vaibhav made us all freeze mid-scroll. What followed wasn’t a flash-in-the-pan cameo. It was carnage. He launched Rashid Khan over midwicket, walked down to Mohammed Siraj in the first over, and dismantled Ishant Sharma with such precision it felt like déjà vu of 2008—when a teenage Kohli had burst onto the scene. But this? This felt even wilder. Because who does this at 14?
By the time he walked off, unbeaten on 101 off just 38 balls, Rajasthan Royals had completed the second-highest successful chase of the season—and Indian cricket had just found its next obsession.
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His 101 off 38 balls—laced with 11 sixes and seven fours—was the second-fastest hundred in IPL history, and comfortably the fastest by an Indian. At just 14 years, he became the youngest centurion in men’s T20 cricket. And now, Rajasthan Royals, staring at elimination after five straight losses, suddenly has a teen titan leading their charge.
The Moment the IPL Stood Still
This year’s IPL has been a pressure cooker. Between the new playoff format, player injuries piling up, and a logjam of mid-table teams all hovering around 12 points, every match has felt like a must-win. For Rajasthan Royals—plagued by inconsistent middle-order form—this was do-or-die. Gujarat Titans had posted 210, anchored by a classic Gill masterclass and a late flourish from Rashid.
Chasing that down would have taken something extraordinary. What we got instead felt mythical. Suryavanshi didn’t ease in or play it safe—he reverse swept his second ball, lofted the third over long-on, and from there, never looked back. His fifty came off 16 balls. His hundred off 38. He hit 11 sixes, danced down the track like he’d done this on bigger stages, and barely celebrated at the end.
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Suryavanshi, hailing from Bihar, made his debut at 12 and scored a youth Test hundred against Australia at 13. It’s tempting to flatten it all into a prodigy story, but Suryavanshi is playing for the keeps. “I don’t think much, I just focus on playing,” he said after the match, echoing the wisdom and the talent of the likes of Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli.
What does this mean going forward? For starters, it shakes up the Royals’ campaign. With Buttler in the game and the middle-order in flux, they now have a new anchor who also happens to be the cleanest striker they’ve fielded all season. It also raises some uncomfortable questions for India’s selectors. Is it too soon? Can you blood a 14-year-old into the national setup? Or is he already too good to ignore?