Assam’s Riyan Parag off to a flying start; top scores in RR practice match

The teams they are cheering for may be different, but all cricket fans from the North East of India will have something in common in this season of the IPL. They all would be closely following the Rajasthan Royals journey. And why not? The poster boy of Assam cricket, Riyan Parag would be representing Rajasthan Royals in his fourth season and this time with a super hike!

Twenty-year-old Riyan had received a bid of Rs 3.8 crore in the auction. That is huge money for sure and it brings in a lot of pressure as well. But, that doesn’t seem to be the case with young Riyan, at least for now. He has played brilliantly in both the practice matches and is almost a certainty to play as a finisher, when Rajasthan Royals play their campaign opener against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Tuesday.

In the last practice match, representing Team Pink, Riyan played a fiery knock to win the match for his team and scored 88 runs off just 43 balls with a strike rate of over 200!! He was the top scorer in the match. ShimronHetmyer, who represented Team Blue had scored 56 runs but in a losing cause.

That’s not all. Riyan scored a quick-fire 49 runs off 27 balls in the first practice match as well to win the match for Team Pink. DevduttPadikkal (67 runs) had top scored for Team Pink in that match.

Both the practice matches have only increased the expectations from Riyan and all eyes will be on him when he takes the field on Tuesday.

Squad:

Sanju Samson (c), Jos Buttler, Yashasvi Jaiswal, R Ashwin, Trent Boult, ShimronHetmyer, DevduttPadikkal, Prasidh Krishna, YuzvendraChahal, Riyan Parag, KC Cariappa, Navdeep Saini, Obed McCoy, Anunay Singh, Kuldeep Sen, Karun Nair, DhruvJurel, TejasBaroka, Kuldip Yadav, ShubhamGarhwal, Jimmy Neesham, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Rassie van der Dussen, Daryl Mitchell

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