Having made his international debut last year, Suryakumar Yadav has established himself as one of India’s leading batters in white-ball cricket.

In 35 T20Is, Yadav has amassed 1060 runs at an average of 37.85 and a strike rate of 176.37, including one hundred and nine half-centuries. He has also made a mark in ODIs, scoring 340 runs from 13 matches at an average of 34 and a strike rate of 98.83 with two fifties.

For Surya, who turned 32 last month, things have turned upside down in the last 18 months. There was a time when he was tired of waiting to be part of the Indian batting line-up.

Speaking to ESPNCricinfo’s Cricket Monthly, Suryakumar recently revealed that switching from hard work to smart work and tweaking certain aspects of his game did wonders to his aspiration of breaking into the national side.

“After 2017-18 me and my wife, Devisha, sat down and decided, let’s do some smart work from here on. You have worked hard, you have come this far, let’s do something else and we will see what happens,” he said.

“I started training in a different way. After 2018 I realised what I needed to work on in my game. I started batting more towards the off side.

“I started dieting. Did a few things which really helped me in the 2018 domestic season and 2019. And going forward, in 2020 my body was completely different.”

Suryakumar Yadav made his international debut in March 2021 in a T20I game against England, 11 years starting his first-class career.

“It took time. It took around a year and a half for me to realise what my body is used to — what will help me, how can I move forward.

“Eventually we both realised, yes, we are moving in the right direction. Then everything was on autopilot. I knew what I had to do, how I had to train, how much practice I had to do,” he said.

“Before that I was just practising, practising, getting a little frustrated sometimes. And I felt there was no quality in that — there was a lot of quantity. But after 2018 there was a lot of quality in my training, diet, net sessions and everything, which helped me really well.

“And then it was a complete build-up, runs coming in all formats, in the IPL as well. So consistency came with that and finally I broke the door.”

Fondly known as Mr 360 for his wide range of strokes, Suryakumar credited rubber-ball cricket for his ability to execute shots all across the field.

“I used to play a lot of rubber-ball cricket during my school days. We used to play on hard cement tracks. People used to just come running and chuck the ball as fast as they could.

“When you are playing with the rubber ball on hard cement, it’s easy for you to scoop, pull, play an uppercut, then play a slice over point. All these strokes which you see me play, square of the wicket and behind square, have come from that,” the right-hander said.

“I have never practised this in the nets, never against the bowling machine. So it has all come from that. How do you create those angles?

“You don’t have any other option when it’s coming at your body — instead of getting hit, you try something.”

(With PTI inputs)