Mamba Mentality: Jurel in the crown

After laying down a marker at Rajasthan Royals in the 2023 IPL, the finisher, a fan of Kobe, primed for massive leap

- GOMESH S

SHORTLY after the 2022 IPL final where Rajasthan Royals lost to Gujarat Titans, 21-year-old Dhruv Jurel who had spent the season on the bench walked up to Kumar Sangakkara.

Jurel asked the director of cricket two things. A) if he would get a chance and b) if yes, where would his position be?

“He explicitly said, ‘you are going to play at 6-7, so you have to train like that,” recalls Jurel in a zoom call with this daily. “From thereon, I started practicing scenarios. If you are batting at 6-7, you will get to bat only three overs, so you have to train like that. I used to hit, say, 150 sixes every day to get that into muscle memory,” he adds.

The work he had put in for a year did not go waste. Even though RR did not go past the league stage, Jurel finished with the highest strike rate (172.72) for an uncapped batter. He has only 152 runs next to his name, but the fact that he got to face only 88 deliveries in 13 games sums up the role he played — come in as an impact player in the final overs and make a mark, shifting the momentum immediately.