‘Brother, this isn’t U19 cricket’ – Tanmay Srivastava reveals sledging incident in Ranji Trophy after U19 World Cup win

Tanmay Srivastava, who plays for Uttarakhand in domestic cricket, has revealed how he got to know the difference of playing in the Ranji Trophy as compared to U19 teams. Back in 2008, India, under Virat Kohli’s leadership, won the U19 World Cup and the left-handed Srivastava played a crucial role in their campaign, scoring 262 runs from six games at an average of 52.40.

The now 30-year-old was also the leading run-scorer of the tournament. However, when he started playing first-class cricket frequently, he had to face quite a bit of sledging from the opposition.

In 2006, the Kanpur-born Srivastava made his debut for Uttar Pradesh and moved to Uttarakhand going into the 2019-20 season. Srivastava put forth his thoughts to sports presenter Yash Kashikar on his Instagram live show ‘Say Yash to Sports.’

Tanmay Srivastava opens up

“When I went to play Ranji Trophy after playing the U-19 WC, I still remember initially for a few games when I took guard..’Piche slips se aawaz aati thi, bhai ye U-19 cricket nahi hai, baccho ka cricket nahi hai.’ So initially, I used to get surprised why people said this. However, over a period of time I realized that FC cricket is the real test,” Srivastava said.

“When you come there after playing at the U-19 level, lot of people follow your performance. So, the first few games become very important. If you do well there, you tend to get a bit comfortable and your position in the team also gets fixed.”

“But, if you don’t perform well, you have to go back and again play age/group cricket, score tons of runs and wait for your chance and see if the team combination works or not,” he added.

Srivastava is yet to don Team India’s jersey, having played 90 first-class, 44 List A and 34 T20s. In his career, he has 7,295 runs with 17 centuries and 41 half-centuries. He didn’t have the greatest of outings in the previous Ranji season. In the tournament, he crossed the 50-run mark only twice with 58 being his top score against Chhattisgarh in Raipur.

In the IPL, Srivastava has played seven games for Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) from 2008 to 2009. But in those matches, he only managed eight runs and thereafter, went off the radar.