Ishan Kishan

Ishan Kishan player profile

Diminutive wicketkeeper and left-hand opening batter Ishan Kishan was among the first Indian cricketers to be better known for their efforts in franchise cricket than in internationals.

A decade into his career, Kishan had played close to 200 T20s, just over 30 of those for India, and won two IPL titles with Mumbai Indians, for whom he had had three seasons in which he scored over 400 runs apiece - including 516 in 2020 when they defended their title successfully.

Kishan made his first-class debut for Jharkhand at 16 in 2014, and scored a hundred and five fifties in his first ten first-class matches. Among the early highlights was a rapid 87, with eight sixes, on a rank Rajkot turner in a Ranji Trophy game against Saurashtra in October 2015. In 2016, he captained India in the Under-19 World Cup in Bangladesh, where his team finished runners-up to West Indies, though he himself didn't exactly shine with the bat on seamer-friendly tracks. Things picked up again In the 2016-17 Ranji Trophy, where he shone with 799 runs from ten games at an average of over 80; 273 of those runs came in a draw against Delhi after Jharkhand had fallen to 80 for 4 in the first innings, and he chased it with 136 in the next game, against Saurashtra.

In the IPL, he had two middling seasons with the short-lived Gujarat Lions franchise before finding his mojo as a dynamo opener at Mumbai Indians.

Kishan's international white-ball debuts came in 2021 and he made fifties in his first match in both formats, but it was the following year that he hit a purple patch, making three T20I fifties in the space of five games against Sri Lanka and South Africa, and then in December making jaws drop with 210 in an away ODI against Bangladesh.

He had a similarly productive time in the middle of 2023, making four ODI fifties in a row, but he only made it into the side for one game in the World Cup in October.

Ishan Kishan IPL factfile

- Having made his mark in the domestic circuit at a young age - and then leading India to the 2016 Under-19 World Cup final, where they lost to West Indies - Ishan Kishan was picked up in the IPL for his base price of INR 35 lakh by replacement team Gujarat Lions in 2016 when Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Rajasthan Royals (RR) were suspended.

- Lions retained him the following year, their last in the IPL, and then he headed to Mumbai Indians (MI) after the IPL 2018 auction.

- After an impressive debut season, when he scored 275 runs at a strike rate touching 150, Kishan struggled in IPL 2019, scoring just 101 runs in seven matches at a strike rate just over 100.

- IPL 2020 proved to be Kishan's breakthrough season as he scored 516 runs, striking at 145.76. His most memorable knock was a 99 in a Super Over loss against Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB).

- After a quiet IPL 2021, Kishan crossed the 400-run mark in the two seasons that followed, as he formed a formidable opening partnership with Rohit Sharma. The two have the highest number of 50-plus partnerships in the IPL (16).