Would not have been surprised if selected for World Cup: Shubman Gill

Two years ago, in early 2017, Shubman Gill was only 17 when he batted with complete authority for India U-19 against the visiting England Colts at the Brabourne Stadium. He had scored an unbeaten 138 as opener and impressed among many others, the India U-19 coach Rahul Dravid.

Making the right progress ever since, Gill is on the verge of achieving something big on the senior stage and cementing his place in the senior team post the ICC Cricket World Cup in England and Wales.

Such is Gill's confidence that at 19 and after having had a decent amount of success with Kolkata Knight Riders in the recent IPL, he told DNA that he would not have been surprised had he been selected for the World Cup.

"It was not like I was expecting the World Cup call. But I would not have been surprised if I would have been selected," Gill told this paper on the sidelines of the CEAT Cricket Ratings awards here recently.

From the U-19 ranks – he was player of the tournament in the Prithvi Shaw-led India U-19 team's triumphant World Cup campaign in New Zealand in 2018 – to earning his maiden ODI call up in New Zealand earlier this year, Gill has impressed everyone with his attractive strokeplay and cricketing attitude.

So much has been said and seen about Gill that India's 2011 World Cup star Yuvraj Singh singled him out to play for a long time for India while the two were together for Punjab in Ranji Trophy in the season just gone by.

Not just Yuvraj. Former West Indies pacer Ian Bishop is a big fan of Gill. Having closely followed him in the 2018 ICC U-19 World Cup as a television commentator and in the IPL, Bishop has always maintained Gill to be a "special talent".

And, former England captain Kevin Pietersen tweeted "You're watching India's next superstar" soon after Gill made a match-winning 65 not out for KKR against KXIP in Mohali.

While these praises from the greats do not flatter Gill, he feels good when they say nice things about him.

"I don't count on these things. When you go into the field to bat, these things don't matter. When I enter the ground, all these things fade away. My only focus is how to score runs. Obviously, it feels great when great players talk good stuff about you," Gill said.

One who is perceived to be mentally sound, the Punjab right-hander says that having a strong mind is what will take him to the next level.

"The main challenge when you go up the level is your mindset. You have to be mentally prepared to be at that level and perform there. I won't say it was really tough and that the oppositions were really tough. The main challenge is your mindset and you have to be mentally ready to perform at that level," Gill said.

Gill, though, did not have a great start to his international career. In his two ODIs in New Zealand at No. 3, after Virat Kohli took a break, Gill had scores of 9 and 7 in Hamilton and Wellington, respectively.

"It has been a really good experience for me overall, a really good learning for me and I am grateful for the experience," he said. "It was a great experience sharing the dressing room with Virat Kohli, Mahendra Singh Dhoni and everyone else. It was a great experience for me seeing those guys, how they handle pressure, how they react in certain situations. It was an overall good learning curve for me," he said of his ODI debut.

"Obviously I was a bit nervous when I got to know that I was going to make my debut. I was really excited, really happy and really willing to do well for my team," he said.

Gill batted at Nos. 6 and 7 in the first half of the IPL 2019 before being promoted to No. 3 and eventually to opening. All his three fifties in the tournament came as an opener. The biggest learning for him from the IPL was that the confidence he has gained about finishing matches and taking his team through.

But having batting right at the top of the order for India U-19 and Punjab, Gill is comfortable there. "It is obviously not the same when you are opening the innings and playing in the middle-order. When opening the innings, you are the one who is going to pace the whole innings. The team will be playing around what you play," Gill said.

"And, when you are batting at No. 6 or 7, you have to do what the team demands. You have to score more than the rate at which the team is going.The situations are different. But, I really enjoyed playing in both the positions.

"If given the choice, I would obviously want to open the innings because that is where I have been batting in Ranji Trophy and everywhere else. Even if not given to open the innings, still I will give my 100 per cent."

Gill, who amassed 296 runs in 14 innings for KKR and scored three fifties, rates his KKR experience as mixed: "Overall experience in IPL was very good. Playing with such big players and winning the matches as a whole team was pleasing. I had some good experience and some bad experience. But overall, it was a good experience," he said.

Ask him if he feels he is a complete batsman, Gill says: "The one thing I felt which was missing was I did not really believe myself that if I could finish things off for my team. This, I was able to do a couple of times in IPL for my team. But, there is room for perfection and room for improvement. I will keep identifying those things and keep improving on them," he says.

With the senior selectors naming Gill for the one-day leg of the India 'A' home series against Sri Lanka 'A' and for the full series of one-dayers and four-day 'Test' on the tour of West Indies, the youngster is keen on cashing on these opportunities.

"I am looking forward to donning the whites for India. I want to perform well in all the 'A' series," he said.