Kushagra, however, returned to bat on day two and resumed as if he was never away. When fast bowler Brendan Doggett slid an inswinger down the leg side, Kushagra neatly picked him away fine past the keeper for four. Then when Fergus O’Neill bowled a perfectly pitched delivery on off, Kushagra made it look like a bad ball, with some serious whippage. He picked it from an off-stump line and shovelled it away with his bottom wrist through the vacant spaces at midwicket.
Soon after Kushagra brought up his hundred, his second in as many matches. The celebration and the construction of the hundreds couldn’t have been more starker.
Around two weeks later in Puducherry, Kushagra wasn’t the one playing the music; instead he was the one facing some chin music from Doggett and O’Neill, both of whom were reversing the older ball sharply. With twin short midwickets in place and the ball tailing sharply into Kushagra, the quicks attacked Kushagra’s upper body.
Kushagra, though, diffused those testing spells and refused to take any undue risks on a mixed-soil surface, which offered variable bounce. After walking in at 86 for 4, which soon became 97 for 5, Kushagra also respected Corey Rocchiccioli, who was generating unusual bounce with his tall frame to go with drift and turn.
Kushagra was also assured in his footwork against Todd Murphy, the other offspinner, going right forward to smother the turn or right back to manufacture some scoring opportunities.
It was only after he passed fifty that Kushagra clicked into a higher gear, drilling part-time legspinner Jason Sangha for fours in successive overs. In all he took Sangha for 17 off 23 balls, but continued to be circumspect against the specialist spinners until he jumped too far across off and missed a big-turning offbreak from Rocchiccoli on day two. By then, Kushagra had moved past his hundred and India A past 325.
Kushagra is only 21, but has already demonstrated his ability to adjust his tempo to the demands of the game situation. It’s perhaps why he’s part of BCCI’s targetted pool of players and was picked ahead of N Jagadeesan for this game. Kushagra seized his chance and put his name forward for higher honours, with a three-match unofficial Test series in New Zealand also on the horizon.
Kushagra is now matured enough to slide up and down the order and make an impact anywhere. In the most recent 20-overs Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, he moved up to No.3 and maximised the powerplay along with Kishan in Jharkhand’s run to the title.
“When I took over as head coach of the Jharkhand senior team last year, our primary objective was clear: Kushagra had the talent, but we needed runs from him across all three formats,” Kumar said after leading East Zone to the Duleep title in Chennai earlier this month. “We focused heavily on that, and he stepped up by scoring nearly 1500 runs across formats last season.
“From there, the sky has been the limit. He broke into India A, had a great tour to Sri Lanka, and we want him to push on and represent the senior Indian team.”
Deivarayan Muthu is a senior sub-editor at Cricinfo