Shubman Gill seems to have accepted the fact that he does not fit into the Indian T20 side. And yet, the Gujarat Titans (GT) skipper served notice of what he is capable of when he became the youngest cricketer to hit the 4,000-run milestone in the Indian Premier League (IPL), breaking Virat Kohli's record during GT’s seven-wicket win against Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) on Sunday.
Gill completed 4,000 runs aged 26 years 216 days and surpassed the record previously held by Kohli, who had achieved the 4,000-run milestone in 2016 at the age of 27 years and 195 days. Gill now has 4,031 runs in 118 IPL innings at an average of 39.91. He has 28 fifties and four hundreds to his name.
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In terms of innings taken, Gill became the fifth fastest batter to register 4,000 runs in IPL. KL Rahul, who breached the 4,000 IPL runs mark in just 104 innings, leads the charts.
With GT chasing the target of 165 runs, Gill scored 56 runs off 40 balls, including six boundaries and a six and the foundation he laid helped his team chase the total down in 18.4 overs, with a 37-ball 60 coming off the bat of Jos Buttler.
With this win, GT are now at fifth spot in the points table with four points after two wins and two losses. LSG, on the other hand, have sunk to sixth spot, having the same win-loss record.
Sensational four-over spells from Prasidh Krishna (4/28), Ashok Sharma (2/32), Rashid Khan (0/25) and Mohamed Siraj (0/19) kept LSG restricted to 164/8, which GT chased down with ease.
Speaking during the post-match presentation, Gill said, "The way we bowled in the powerplay was very impressive and how we kept up the pressure in the middle overs was tremendous. [Rashid Khan] Makes my life very easy, the way Rashid is bowling at the moment. Getting us back in the game every time another bowler is under pressure."
Gill added that while it was difficult to do simple things during powerplay, Siraj managed to do that well.
"That got us back in the game, the way Siraj bowled. And even KG (Kagiso Rabada), he went for runs but he was spot on with the lengths," he added.
On the batting surface, Gill admitted it was not easy to bat on and expressed satisfaction with his and Buttler’s form.
"Back-to-back fifties for me and Jos, so very happy to be in form," he signed off.
