7 facts about Prayas Ray Barman: The 1.5 crore pick by Royal Challengers Bangalore in the IPL 2019 auction

Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) picked up a few renowned faces in the auction of the Indian Premier League (IPL) yesterday, including the likes of Shimron Hetmyer and Heinrich Klaasen. However, they also resorted to picking a few youngsters, one of them was Prayas Ray Barman. He was listed at a base of INR 20 lakhs and was an unknown entity until the auction in Jaipur.

Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) started bidding for Barman and then RCB joined them. After an intense bidding war between the two franchises, Bangalore eventually managed to bag his services at a price of INR 1.50 crores. Subsequently, he also became the youngest millionaire in the history of the cash-rich T20 tournament. In our article, we take you through his brief cricketing career.

Born in Durgapur

Prayas Ray Barman, a right-arm leg-break bowler, was born on October 25, 2002, in Durgapur. The 16-year-old was brought up in New Delhi where his father, Dr. Kaushik Ray Barman, works as a general physician.

Initial days of cricket  

His cricketing journey began at the Ram Pal Cricket Academy in Gargi College in South Delhi. However, the pugnacious potential started growing as a cricketer in Durgapur where he honed his skills at the Durgapur Cricket Centre under the tutelage of Shibnath Ray.

There, he managed to catch the attention in the Ambar Roy Sub-Junior Under-14 cricket tournament. After getting picked for Bengal U16 team, he shifted his base to Kolkata where he lives in a small flat with his grandparents near Dumdum Park in North Kolkata. He and his father also keep shuttling from New Delhi to Kolkata.

After getting picked for RCB, Barman is excited to shift to Bangalore, the place where his sister works as an IT professional.

Impressive stint for Bengal U15

Prayas represented Bengal U15 in their series against Bangladesh U15 in 2012-13. During that series, he took seven wickets in four matches at an average of 20.42.

List A debut

Barman made his List A debut for Bengal in the erstwhile Vijay Hazare Trophy. He played his first match against Jammu and Kashmir at Sri Sivasubramaniya Nadar College of Engineering Ground in Chennai on September 20, 2018.

Match-winning spell against J&K

In the very first match, he ended with figures of 5-0-20-4, which helped his team bowl J&K out for 96 in 23.4 overs. During his stupendous spell, he also dismissed Parvez Rasool, who has donned the Indian colours in limited-overs cricket. Bengal won the match by six wickets with 176 balls to spare.

All in all, Barman has played nine List A matches in which he has picked up 11 wickets at an average of 23 and a strike-rate of 31.00. More importantly, he bowls at an economy of 4.45, which shows that he can restrict the batsmen from unleashing their wide range of strokes.

A fan of Shane Warne

He is an effective right-arm leg-spinner, who doesn’t turn the ball much and rather, pushes it through. But he’s a fan of legendary Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne, who used to rely more on giving the ball air and extracting turn from the pitch. Barman is pretty tall, his height being 6’1 inch, and people around him say that he bowls alike Anil Kumble, the former Indian spinner.

Dream with Virat Kohli

Prayas is a fan of current Indian all-format captain Virat Kohli and considers him as his role model. Moreover, he has a dream of getting a picture clicked with the 30-year-old. Previously, he attempted to make his dream come true a number of times, but he was only greeted with disappointment.

Youngest IPL debutant

March 31, 2019- He would remember the day for a long time as he became the youngest player to make his debut in the IPL. He achieved the feat at the age of 16 years and 157 days. The previous youngest was Afghanistan’s Mujeeb Ur Rahman at the age of 17 years and 11 days.

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