If I perform well, I will get recognition wherever I play: Saurabh Wakaskar

If I perform well, I will get recognition wherever I play: Saurabh Wakaskar: The 24-year old Saurabh Wakaskar, made his first-class debut, representing Baroda, in the game against Delhi on 17th November 2012, played at Firoz Shah Kotla, Delhi.

The left-handed opener, lasted only for 85 minutes, faced 52 deliveries and struck a couple of boundaries to score 22 runs in the first innings. There was no second innings in the drawn match.

Having played for Baroda in three seasons (2012-13, 2013-14 and 2014-15), Wakaskar had featured in 21 games (37 innings) and scored 1,506 runs at an average of 44.29 with 4 centuries to his credit.

At the beginning of the current season (2015-16), Wakasar opted to represent Railways. Speaking to ESPNCricinfo on his transfer, the youngster said, “Initially, it took me time to adjust. They (the players) were all new and we did not know one another. As time went on, and with more gelling, things started becoming better. I stayed with the rest of the team during the off-season camp and started opening up. I did not have to do anything different. They started knowing me better and vice-versa.”

Shifting to Railways, Wakaskar, has featured in all the seven games played thus far, in this season and has been a key member of the team’s Playing XI. He has accumulated 568 runs from 14 innings at an average of 40.57 with 185 runs as his individual best. This came in the second innings in the game against Mumbai played at Wankhede Stadium, between 15th and 18th November 2015.

Trailing by 114 runs in the first innings, Railways went on to put up 408/4 decl in their second knock, primarily due to a good batting display by Wakaskar (185, 415m, 294b. 16 fours, 3 sixes) and a well made 133 (326m, 217b, 13 fours) by Vairamudi Cheluvaraj. The duo also established 253 runs second-wicket partnership in 68.2 overs. This was the best partnership for any wicket in the match. However, all these efforts came to a nought since Mumbai won the match by six wickets.

After seven rounds (7 games), Railways are in the 9th position in the Group B points table. They have won just 1 game and lost 6 of them and have only 6 points to their credit with a negative net run-rate of 0.044.

About the poor showing of Railways, Wakaskar said, “Our team effort is not up to the mark, so we are not doing well this year. Actually, we did really well last year and last to last year we qualified for the quarters and all. This year I think team effort is not that much.”

Wakaskar, on his part, has been contributing well with the bat, having a century (185) and three half-century (69, 93 and 73) knocks. He ranks seventh in the table of highest run-scorers with Shreyas Iyer leading with 781 runs from 6 games (9 innings), followed by Prembhastn Rohan Prem (670, 10 innings), Paras Dogra (647, 8 innings), Kedar Devdhar (618, 11 innings) , Sudip Chatterjee (608, 1 innings) and Parvez Rasool (569, 12 innings).

Reacting on his shift to a relatively weaker side, Railways, Wakaskar said, “I personally think it doesn’t matter (whether) it’s Baroda or Railways, we are playing at the same level, ultimately playing the Ranji Trophy only.”

‘If I perform well, I will get recognition wherever I play. If I don’t, it doesn’t matter which team I turn out for. So it depends on how I perform and how my season is progressing.”