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XtraTime Web Desk: Shreyas Iyer is touted as the future No 4 for Team India in the shorter formats. The 25 year old Shreyas has done justice to the faith reposed on him by the team management so far. The cricketer from Mumbai was a revelation in New Zealand tour earlier this year when he ended up being the top run-getter for India batting at No 4 position. Shreyas scored 217 runs which included a century and two fifties in the series whitewash against BlackCaps. Prior to the series against New Zealand, Shreyas also impressed during the tour of West Indies when he scored two half-centuries, but he batted at No 5. Having tried the likes of Ambati Rayudu, Vijay Shankar and Rishabh Pant, Indian team management chose to try Shreyas at No 4. So far the Delhi Capitals skipper has been successful.
But if you look back at the career of the Mumbai cricketer, there has been two moments that has transformed his career. One when he was 16 years old, when his father took him to a sports psychologist as his performance dipped. Like every responsible parents Shreyas’s dad noticed his son losing focus in cricket. A young Shreyas looked a more confident cricketer. He was soon spotted by Pravin Amre at the Shivaji Gymkhana, under whom he honed his batting skills.

After doing well in age level cricket Shreyas got a chance in the India U19 World Cup squad but failed to impress on the slow-ish tracks of UAE. It was at this time the second turnaround came in his life. The youngster was sent to England to play for Clifton Village Cricket Club. He was all by himself, making his own meals besides playing cricket. It was a huge learning experience for Shreyas, as he started enjoying the atmosphere in Clifton. He scored four hundreds in 12 matches and was quite a sensation among the locals there. The stint in Clifton gave Shreyas the confidence to go on and deliver stand-out performances in the domestic tournaments to follow. He averaged more than 50 in the Vijay Hazare trophy and Ranji Trophy that followed, scoring an incredible 809 runs at 50.56 in his maiden Ranji season. In the subsequent Ranji seasons, his volume of runs bordered on the ridiculous as he amassed 1321 runs in the 2015/16 edition including 7 fifties and 4 hundreds and an unprecedented average of 73.39.

Since making his ODI debut against Sri Lanka, Shreyas has so far scored 748 runs in 18 ODIs at an average of 50 with one century and eight half-centuries. In 22 T20Is, he has 417 runs at an average of 27 plus and a strike rate of 129.50.