Local touch: Man of the hour Ishan’s rise

Practice sessions with state team have helped him thrive at big stage

- FIROZ MIRZA @Chennai

The return of Ishan Kishan is one of the most read inspiring stories in recent times. Enduring the worst moments in his career, Ishan was forced to go back to domestic cricket to stitch his life piece by piece.

Back then, practice and matches kept him in good stead. As times passed, he discarded his maverick lifestyle and concentrated on his cricket. There is maturity in his innings and the new phase is just blossoming.

It was evident on Sunday again. On a R Premadasa wicket in Colombo where run scoring was not easy, India opener played one of the best knocks of his career so far, scoring a 40-ball 77. That proved to be the difference between the two sides as India humbled Pakistan by 61 runs to sail into the Super Eights of the T20 World Cup.

Ahead of that match, the 27-year-old from Jharkhand hammered a 24-ball 61 against Namibia in Delhi apart from a half-century against South Africa in a warm-up match. Not to forget his one century and a half-century against New Zealand in the T20I series preceding the marquee event that brought him into the playing XI. And that has been Kishan’s template in the last few months — pile on runs — no matter what the format is.