'I want to bat like Sachin Tendulkar and keep wickets like MS Dhoni,' says Shafali Verma

Shafali Verma, the Haryana-born cricketer has hit the spotlight after she showed her brilliance with the willow against South Africa. She got her debut match for India against South Africa but it didn’t go the way debutant had wished for as she got out for a duck. Later, she played a swashbuckling knock of 46 runs in 33 balls during the 4th T20I against Proteas and certainly redeemed her form.

She is quite different from other kids of her age. In India when the majority of the grassroots cricketers start looking forward to their career, at that time she has got the spot in Team India for a limited-overs format. Recently, in an interview, Shafali has come down with her views after breaking the record of Master Blaster and what she wants to achieve in her future as a cricketer.

Shafali Verma had broken the record of Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar on her debut, as she became the youngest player to debut for Team India, and when she was asked about it. 15-year-old cricketer feels that it is still a dream come true for her, and is looking forward to playing games in every format though her obvious choice is to play in T20I.

“I am very happy about becoming the youngest (cricketer) ever. But I am not losing my sleep thinking over it. It’s just the start. I want to play in all formats of the game, though Twenty20 remains my favorite. I just want to concentrate on my game and not pay much attention to records. I want to bat like Sachin Tendulkar and keep wickets like MS Dhoni,” Shafali told in her interview to Republic TV.

Apart from breaking record of Sachin Tendulkar, her coach Sanjay Badhwar feels that she plays like former Indian skipper MS Dhoni and is very good at her reflexes and is very quick at dislodging the bails from his wicketkeeping. “I would say her game is more like MS Dhoni. She has quick reflexes and is quite good at catching and uprooting the stumps. She also has a very solid and matured cricketing mind like Dhoni,” Sanjay quoted.

Shafali was brought into the T20I squad on the basis of her brilliant performance in the domestic circuit where she managed to get more than 1200 runs comprising of eight centuries in last season.

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