Dasun Shanaka on Vaibhav Sooryavanshi’s form

“He (Vaibhav) is very professional. So it’s not about failing or getting runs. But what he does at the practice and how he behaves in the dressing room. And how cool he is. So I haven’t seen a kid like him behaving in the dressing room like that. Even the seniors, they will put them under a lot of pressure but this guy is very cool. I really love the way he is coping with the things whether he plays or he gets runs, he is very natural. I see a lot of potential in him and a lot of good things. I wish him all the best for his future,” said Shanaka while addressing the media ahead of the Eliminator at Mullanpur.

In the league stage, the Royals have seen their top three scoring the majority of runs with Vaibhav Sooryavanshi leading the batting charts for the Rajasthan teams with a total of 583 runs. Dhruv Jurel sits at the 15th spot in the leading run-getters in this IPL with 458 runs with Royals’ opener Yashasvi Jaiswal with a total of 397 runs at the 19th spot. During their win against Mumbai Indians last week, Royals were 54 for 3 before they slumped to 139 for six. A 15-ball knock of 32 runs by Jofra Archer helped the team reach a total of 205 runs before the team won the match by 30 runs. When asked about the team’s middle-order not facing enough pressure situations, the all-rounder shared that the middle-order including him sees this as an opportunity. “Most of the time, the top order has done the job for us. It’s about handling different situations. Sometimes playing for the surface. You need to give it some time. But why we feel that we aren’t coping with the pressure is because the top order’s strike rate is very high. But you need to give that little bit of time to middle order batsman to establish. So as a middle order batsman, who has played a lot of cricket, I feel we need to stay and give some time to ourselves. The key to success is these tough situations,” shared Shanaka.

Having finished fourth in the league stage and qualifying for the play-offs with a win in their last match, the Royals need to win three successive matches in their bid to win the title. If the team wins against Sunrisers’ Hyderabad, they will be facing the loser of the Qualifier 1 in the Qualifier 2 at Mullanpur and a win in that match will get them into the final. When asked about how the team sees the challenge of winning three successive matches to win the title, Shanaka shared how the team is in a good mental shape. “See, it’s a good challenge. Doesn’t have any pressure. We need to bring our best game in the knockout games. So hopefully we got a lot of trump cards with us. So we don’t want to do the mistakes that we have done in the first phase of the tournament, We are in good mental shape as well and everybody wants to deliver. Looking forward to the game,” said Shanaka.

When asked about players like captain Ryan Parag and Ravindra Jadeja carrying some niggles, the stand-in skipper shared that the two players will be fine. “They had some niggles but they will be fine. Hopefully they will be fine,” said Shanaka.