Vaibhav Sooryavanshi’s 36-ball century against Sunrisers Hyderabad felt inevitable the moment the 15-year-old walked in for Rajasthan. Two IPL hundreds before most players finish school is extraordinary. Inevitably the question has followed: should India fast-track him into the senior T20 side?
Former West Indies all-rounder Carlos Brathwaite believes a middle path is wiser. Speaking on ESPNcricinfo’s Time:Out, he drew a parallel with another left-handed prodigy.
“I apologise, Vaibhav, but if you look at how West Indies handled Brian Lara… he was a generational talent, everyone knew,” Brathwaite said. “Actually my dad left my mum’s bedside when I was about to be born so that he could watch Brian Lara play!”
Back in the late 1980s Lara toured with senior West Indians without playing an international straightaway. The stint, Brathwaite argues, allowed him to learn the rhythms of elite cricket minus the public glare.
“So what did West Indies do? They put him in the mix with Viv Richards and what not, but he didn’t play,” he recalled. “That was a different time with loads of tour games, and he cut his teeth with the senior players without having made his debut. And then we know how his career went once he debuted.”
The same template, Brathwaite feels, could work for Sooryavanshi.
“So maybe there is the best of both worlds – where you can have him with the Indian team – learn from Virat, learn from Rohit, learn from Suryakumar Yadav. There are younger players that are close to him in age that he can learn from, before just throwing him in the deep end.”
Deep Dasgupta, India’s former wicketkeeper, broadly agrees. The teenager, he says, can already cope with pace, spin and the tactical traps bowlers set in franchise cricket. The real examination will come when the inevitable lean patch arrives.
“We’ve seen some really good talents go a little bit awry,” Dasgupta observed. “People talk about ‘he should be in the Indian side’ and fair enough. But there are two sides to this story and two major things you need, technical acumen and mental acumen.”
On the technical side, Dasgupta is convinced.
“Technically, he’s there – we’ve seen how he has played against the top bowlers of the world. So we know he can handle the technical side of it. But the mental side of it – he will have his ups and downs. Now whether he is ready mentally to handle it or not… we have to be a little careful on how to handle it.”
For many young players, the second IPL season is tougher than the first. Bowlers have video footage, analysts build data-driven plans, and the surprise element evaporates. Sooryavanshi has answered that challenge emphatically: 357 runs in seven innings this year, already eclipsing the 252 he managed across the whole of 2025.
“The first year could’ve been a flash, whatever, an unknown commodity,” Dasgupta noted. “But year two is always challenging with bowlers having plans, but we’ve seen what has happened in this second year. So he is a very, very special talent.”
Selection talk will not die down, especially with a T20 World Cup less than a year away. India’s top order is settled, yet the game moves quickly; few coaches ignore a player who can strike at over 200 while appearing unhurried. Even so, the consensus from those who have lived the journey is that timing matters as much as talent.
Brathwaite summed it up in simple terms. Give Sooryavanshi a glimpse of international life, let him absorb the dressing-room standards, but resist the urge to hand out a cap immediately. Do that, he says, and the youngster might shape the league – and perhaps Indian cricket – for a decade or more.
“India call-up or not,” Brathwaite concluded, “the way Sooryavanshi is going, he could be ‘the face’ of the IPL.”
