India's T20I captain Surya Kumar Yadav will join the 100-T20I-matches club when he leads the Men in Blue against New Zealand in the first of the five-match series in Nagpur on Wednesday.
Surya will become only the fourth player to feature in 100 or more T20I games for India. Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Hardik Pandya are the other Indians who have played over T20I games. It has taken Surya nearly six years to reach this landmark. The hard-hitting batter made his T20I debut (also his international debut) in 2021 against England at the Narendra Modi Stadium.
Surya did not get a chance to bat in his first match, but in his second match and first innings, Surya made sure he gave the Indian cricket fans a moment to savour. A confident Surya took on English pacer Jofra Archer and hammered the very-first delivery of his international career for a six. Surya eventually ended up scoring 57 off 31 balls to set up India's 8-run win and walked away with the Player of the Match award.
The hard-hitting batter has accumulated 2,788 runs in his T20I career at an average of 35.29 at a strike rate of 163.23. The 35-year-old has struck four hundreds in his T20I career, which is the second most number of centuries in men's T20Is. He is only behind Glenn Maxwell and Rohit Sharma both of whom have 5 tons in the format.
His five Player of the Series awards from 26 tournaments highlights the impact he has had ever-since arriving on the international stage. To put his five Player of the Series awards in context, it is the same number of Player of the Series awards that David Warner, Babar Azam and Shakib Al Hasan have won. But Surya has picked those awards at a better rate than his competitors from Australia, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Babar's five Player of the Series awards have come in 136 matches and 39 series, Warner won his five Player of the Series awards in 110 games and 42 tournaments and Shakib clinched his Player of the Series awards from 129 games and 45 series.
Yet another piece of statistic that highlights Surya's domination in T20is is the sheer number of sixes that he has hit. With 155 maximums, Surya has recorded the fifth most number of sixes in the men's T20I history. Here again some context is needed.
Surya and UAE's Muhammad Waseem are the only two players among the top-10 batters with most sixes in all of men's T20Is who have played less than 100 games thus far. Waseem has hit his 187 sixes in 91 games while Surya has registered 155 sixes in 99 matches. Considering the quality of opponents that Surya and Waseem have played against at international level, we get to understand the enormity of Surya's achievements.
Some more crucial numbers will go in Surya's record books in coming weeks. When he leads India in the upcoming T20 World Cup, he will become only the fourth player to captain India in the marquee tournament. Before him only MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma have had the honour to captain India in the T20 World Cups.
With the T20 World Cup final set to be played in Ahemdabad, the city where he made his international debut and played his first T20I innings, Surya has the chance to become the first-ever captain to lift the prestigious trophy on his home soil.
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