Suryakumar slammed 60* off 21 balls in Mumbai's SMAT opener against Hyderabad.
Suryakumar Yadav blasted an unbeaten 60 off 21 balls to power Mumbai to a seven-wicket win over Hyderabad in their 2026-27 Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy opener in Kolkata on Saturday (November 14).
Playing his first major domestic match since May's IPL and his subsequent removal from India's T20I setup, the Mumbai skipper declared he is ready to "knock down the [selectors'] door" to reclaim his national spot.
"After winning the [T20] World Cup you naturally think that you will play in India's next series after the IPL," Suryakumar said after the game, as quoted by Cricinfo.
"It's not easy to win an ICC event, especially at home, which nobody has done in the past. It felt great to win that tournament. But the selectors must have thought of something to decide [to change captaincy]. But I was definitely disappointed. If you're not sad after such things how will you turn it into passion? The same hunger that I had to play for India is back now. I want to play for the country again, so I have to knock down the [selectors'] door."
Chasing 173 at the Jadavpur University Campus 2nd Ground, Surya reached his half-century in just 15 balls and finished with six fours and five sixes at a strike rate of 285.71.
"My intent is clear - to make a comeback," he stated. "When you have that target in mind to play for India, you work in one direction and bat in a disciplined way. I have worked on a lot of things from my mental game to the skills."
Suryakumar emphasized that his ultra-aggressive middle-overs batting is not merely to make a point. Instead, he noted it is an adaptation to modern T20 cricket, where maintaining a powerplay-level run rate through overs 7 to 15 is essential to reaching par totals of 225 to 260
"It's not about giving a statement," he said. "You can see how the T20 game is changing. Till 2024 the game was slightly different and then from 2024 to 2026 we played a different brand of cricket where 190-220 was being scored and sometimes 250 as well. But now in every game you see 225, 230 and 240 being scored. The openers give a great start in the powerplay, like today we scored 75-80 [79] runs in the first six overs. But after that also you need to score at a similar pace from the seventh to 15th overs, like we saw in the Indian team. If we have to reach scores like 250-260 then I'm part of that strategy.
"Playing the high-risk-high-reward game has been my approach in the middle overs but now I'm trying to take even more risk to hit more fours and sixes. Now this format is all about fours and sixes. There are very few games where a team is 50 for 4 or 60 for 5, otherwise it's always a 200-225 kind of game. So my attempt is to dominate as much as I can in the middle overs against spinners and fast bowlers."
Four of Suryakumar's straight sixes sailed out of the ground and required ball replacements, all while national selector SS Das watched from the sidelines.
When asked if this knock was any kind of message for the selectors, the Mumbai captain recalled a scene from the Bollywood movie MS Dhoni: The Untold Story.
"In the movie his friends said that hit sixes where the selectors are sitting," Suryakumar quipped. "That was my plan today. It would have been nice if the selectors were sitting near the straight boundary. My aim is to score runs consistently and help the team win. I'm just enjoying this entertaining format and want to play freely."
Despite captaining India to a T20 World Cup title on home soil earlier in 2026, Suryakumar Yadav was dropped from the T20I side and replaced as skipper by Shreyas Iyer following an extended lean run with the bat.
After spending months training away from the national setup, Suryakumar thanked Mumbai Cricket Association president Ajinkya Naik for entrusting him with the captaincy, calling the role a gesture of respect.
"More than captaincy this responsibility is about respect," he said. "I had not played any cricket for two-three months after the IPL after I lost my place in the Indian team; I just trained and practiced. At a time like this, it was a big thing to support me and make me the Mumbai captain. Ajinkya Naik (MCA president) could have made anyone the captain but I'll always be grateful for the the love and respect he showed me. I had started my cricket from here and it's time to pay my association back."