Former England captain Sir Alastair Cook has shared an ‘unusual’ aspect that he noted in Vaibhav Sooryavanshi’s batting during his brilliant time in the IPL 2026. In his first full season for Rajasthan Royals (RR), Sooryavanshi blew everyone away with his explosive batting and maturity beyond his 15 years of age.
Sooryavanshi finished the tournament with 776 runs in 16 games, with a strike rate of 237.30, with one century and five fifties in IPL 2026. He ended up winning Most Valuable Player as well as the Emerging Player of the Season and also won the Orange Cap for most runs as well.
He also broke Chris Gayle’s record for most sixes in a single IPL season (59) and hit 72 maximums in IPL 2026. His scores of 97 in 29 balls against SRH in the Eliminator and 96 off 47 balls against GT in Qualifier 2 are considered two of the best knocks played in IPL playoffs history.
Alastair Cook stated that one thing he noticed about Sooryavanshi was that he never premeditates his shots, and his shots are pure skill-based.
"I think the one thing about it is there doesn't seem to be any premeditation. Most batsmen, even the best hitters, are literally waiting for that ball to be in their one slot for six. They might have two slots. But with him, you bowl five balls, and he'll wait for a ball at 99 miles per hour, then react to it and still hit it for six. So cleanly. I think that's what's unusual,” Cook said on The Overlap Cricket podcast.
Even another England captain, Michael Vaughan, spoke highly of him.
"I was in the pool last week in Mumbai. Rajasthan is playing Mumbai—a must-win game to go through to the playoffs. Yashasvi Jaiswal comes and has a chat, and then the kid (Sooryavanshi) arrives, and I start off: 'It's a pleasure to meet you.' Full admiration for the way you play. How do you prepare for the matches?' He went: 'Watching cartoons.' I was like... alright. I said, 'Are you training?' He went, 'No.' I said, 'What do you eat?' He went, 'Everything.' I said—there's the modern player. Watch a cartoon, eat what you want, smack it out of the ground," he said.
Sooryavanshi will be seen in action for India A in the one-day tri-series in Sri Lanka. There are also reports that he might be picked for the T20I series in Ireland.
