Rajasthan Royals (RR) young batter, Riyan Parag, was heavily criticized for being unable to give a late push to his team after they lost the IPL 2022 final to Gujarat Titans (GT) on Sunday, May 29 at Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.
Parag was dismissed for only 15 as RR ended up scoring 130/9 in 20 overs. Later, Gujarat Titans (GT) chased down the target with ease in the 19th over to be crowned IPL 2022 champions.
The 19-year-old wasn’t impressive throughout the tournament, managing just 183 runs from 17 matches at a strike rate of 138.64 and one fifty.
Amidst the criticism, RR Director of Cricket and head coach, Kumar Sangakkara, supported Parag and said that he will make sure that the youngster gets proper grooming in the IPL 2023.
Sangakkara said in the post-match presser: “I think Riyan Parag, he has got a huge amount of potential, and we got to work him into higher batting number by the time we come in next season. I look forward to kind of grooming him to become more of a kind of an early middle-order player rather than just a death-hitter. Because I think he is so accomplished against spin as well as pace.”
He added, “Well, we have got a lot of improving to do in all areas. If you take our batting, we had huge contributions from Jos (Buttler), Sanju, and Shimron Hetymer at the early stages.”
The Sri Lanka legend signed off by saying that RR must take lessons from the IPL 2022 final loss against GT and must not be complacent about finishing as runners-up.
(News18 inputs)
