India’s Suryakumar Yadav has been in sensational form ever since he made his T20I debut in March last year. Nicknamed SKY, the Mumbai Indians batsman smashed his first ball in international cricket for a six, that too to Jofra Archer!
Since then, there has been no stopping Suryakumar Yadav in T20 internationals. In 29 T20I innings, he has scored 926 runs at an average of 37 and strike rate of 174 with 7 fifties and a century.
Hailed as India’s best 360-degree batsman, there isn’t any pronounced weakness of Suryakumar. In fact, if anything, he’s one of the best batters in the world at manipulating the field, finding gaps and playing with the bowlers’ minds. With what seems like an extra split-second at his skillset, Suryakumar has an extraordinary ability to hit the same ball in different directions.
Suryakumar Yadav is the leading T20I run-scorer in the world in 2022: he leads the charts this year with 682 runs in 20 innings at 37, and has scored runs at an astonishing strike rate of 182. He’s notched up a century – in England – and 4 T20I fifties. He has ascended to the number 3 spot in the ICC T20I ranking.
Considering only full members, Mohammad Rizwan is behind Suryakumar Yadav with 556 runs in 11 innings at a brilliant average of 61, but with a strike rate of 127 which is a bit low as modern T20 opener standards.
Following Suryakumar Yadav and Mohammad Rizwan is West Indies skipper Nicholas Pooran who has scored 553 runs so far in 2022 at 36/135 with the help of 5 fifties. Zimbabwe’s Sikandar Raza (516) and Sri Lanka’s Pathum Nissanka (499) are next on this list of most T20I runs this year.
Suryakumar Yadav set to break Shikhar Dhawan’s record:
When it comes to Indians, Shikhar Dhawan has accumulated the most runs in a calendar year – in 2018, Dhawan recorded 689 runs in 17 innings at an average of 40 and strike rate of 147 with the help of 6 fifties. Suryakumar is just 7 runs behind Dhawan and there are about a dozen T20Is more to play for India this year.
The overall record of most runs for a batsman in T20Is is 1326 made by Pakistani opener Mohammad Rizwan in 2021; promoted as an opener, Rizwan turned his career and changed history as he raised 12 fifties and one century in T20Is last year along with the skipper and opening partner, Babar Azam, who is second on the list with 939 runs also last year.
So given that Suryakumar Yadav bats at number 4 for India, it is going to be really difficult for him to break Rizwan’s record, for which Suryakumar still needs 644 runs in about a dozen games left this year.
