Who is Prithvi Shaw? If you read or listened to some of the things being said about him right now, you’d think he was some never-do-well who had somehow fluked his way into playing for India, an imposter who had conned an Indian Premier League franchise into paying 8 crores for his services.
Who is Prithvi Shaw? Before you answer, just consider some facts. Facts, those undisputable things. Not opinions, which even someone without an iota of knowledge can have. Shaw made his Test debut for India when not even 19. After the incomparable Sachin Tendulkar, he is the youngest Indian to score a Test century. And unlike Tendulkar, he did it in his debut innings. Shaw has 12 centuries from 74 first-class innings, including the second-highest score made by an Indian – 379 from just 383 balls for Mumbai against Assam last January.
He will be the first to admit that consistency has been elusive in the IPL, save for a remarkable season in 2021 when he smashed four half-centuries and 479 runs at a tremendous strike-rate of 159. But again, if you looked at the social-media barometer, you could be forgiven for assuming that he’s the worst to have ever held a bat.
Again, some more perspective. Shaw just turned 23 five months ago. Virat Kohli had only just scored his first Test hundred for India by then. Rohit Sharma made his first ODI ton for India a month after turning 23. He didn’t even play Test cricket till he was 26.
Those in the Delhi Capitals dugout are better-equipped than most to help Shaw out of his rut. A generation ago, in 1998, Ricky Ponting, the Delhi head coach at present, came to India touted as one of the best young batters in the world. He was 23. He left with 105 runs in five innings, and a bad reputation after a scuffle with security guards in a Kolkata nightclub.
Three years later, by which time he was considered one of the elite and a future Australian captain, Ponting tallied 17 runs in five innings, repeatedly flummoxed by Harbhajan Singh’s off-spin. Sourav Ganguly, who sits alongside him in the Delhi dugout, didn’t do much better in that 2001 series. Despite leading Indian to an epic come-from-behind victory, his personal contribution was 106 runs in six innings.
Talk of his vulnerability against the short ball shadowed Ganguly throughout his career. When India landed in Brisbane in November 2003 for the start of Steve Waugh’s farewell Test series, local tabloids promised him ‘chin music’. Ganguly didn’t respond with words, but he struck one of his finest Test hundreds, 144 on a spicy Gabba pitch, to end that particular discussion. He finished his career with 18,575 international runs, and 38 centuries – not too shabby for someone who allegedly couldn’t handle balls banged into mid-pitch.
Shaw’s problems are two-fold. When your team is losing, and Delhi have endured a nightmare start to the 2023 season, there will always be increased scrutiny and a hunt for scapegoats. Secondly, when you’re struggling, even luck can desert you. Against Royal Challengers Bangalore, it wasn’t a loose stroke that cost Shaw his wicket, but a sprawling dive and direct hit from Anuj Rawat.
It can be easy to slump further in such situations. During one of the worst years of his Test career, in 2003, Tendulkar kept finding different ways to get out. In the Boxing Day Test, he tickled a leg-side loosener from Brett Lee off the first ball he faced, and Adam Gilchrist took the catch behind the stumps.
Greg Chappell, the Australian batting great who was commentating on that series, said at the time: “That’s exactly the sort of thing that happens to you when you’re going through a rough patch.” In the second innings, Tendulkar batted quite beautifully for 44 before nicking Brad Williams behind. It meant that he ended the calendar year with just 153 runs from nine Test innings, the worst 12-month stretch in a career that spanned nearly a quarter-century.
But Chappell had seen enough in the 107 minutes that Tendulkar spent at the crease in the second innings. “He’s seeing the ball well, and striking it cleanly. The feet are moving well. Don’t be too surprised if there’s a big one in Sydney.”
Tendulkar started the new year with an unbeaten 248.
The last thing Shaw needs is a Tendulkar comparison. Those have ruined enough careers by creating unrealistic expectations. What we can do, however, is show some patience and empathy. Shaw is 23. Why would you give up on someone that young? Maybe Delhi will take him out of the firing line for a couple of matches. Maybe they won’t. Either way, he needs to be given time to find his way again.
As for Shaw himself, he could do worse than to switch off. To be fair to him, despite his half a million followers on Twitter and 1.7m on Instagram, he isn’t big on social-media updates. But shutting out any such noise would probably help. No player is ever as good as the fan boys and girls would have you believe. And no one is as rubbish as the critics tell you either.
Shaw needs to go back to what made him such a standout talent in the first place. Before contracts and endorsements and social-media controversies, there was a young boy who saw the ball, and hit it. He needs to reconnect with that kid, and rediscover the joy that comes with seeing the ball ping off the sweet spot of your bat. Ponting and Ganguly will almost certainly give him the time and space to do that.