The 19-year-old Australian talented cricketer Jason Sangha has recently claimed that the media hype affected him in past when he was compared with the legendary cricketers Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting.
Sangha is ready to feature for Cricket Australia XI in this week when they will play a three-day warm-up game against Sri Lanka at Bellerive Oval (Hobart) between 17 and 19 January.
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In his early days of professional cricket, the Indian origin Sangha joined New South Wales (NSW) in 2016 and impressed hugely with his batting performances. The right-handed batsman made his first-class debut in 2017 while earlier, he made his List A (in 2016) and T20 debut (in 2017).
In November 2017, prior to the 2017/18 Ashes Series, Sangha featured for Cricket Australia XI in a four-day warm-up game against England at Tony Ireland Stadium (Townsville) where he scored his maiden first-class century. During CA XI’s second innings in that game, Sangha scored 133 runs off 226 balls (13 fours and one six) at the crucial time to secure a draw for his team.
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He led the Australian U19 side in the 2018 ICC U19 Cricket World Cup in New Zealand where his team finished as the runners-up after losing the final against India U19 by 8 wickets. Sangha was the leading run-scorer for his team in that tournament as he scored 229 runs in six innings with the average of 38.16, including two half-centuries.
His impressive early performances attracted the national media hugely as they started to compare him with the Indian legendary cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and the Australian legendary cricketer Ricky Ponting. Sangha recently claimed that those comparisons affected him in past but now he is enjoying the cricket.
Sangha told the reporters, “You can’t really hide away from all the hype in the media, in the past it’s really affected me. And I’ve been my own worst enemy sometimes when it comes to that sort of stuff. But in recent years I’ve learnt to enjoy the game a bit more and try and do my best for where the team is.”
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The upcoming warm-up game against Sri Lanka at Hobart will be the day/night game and it will be played with the pink-ball. Sangha is excited to feature in that game.
The young cricketer said, “For me it’s about learning a bit more about pink-ball cricket. I’m very excited for the opportunity. As long as I’m learning each game, whether it’s today or the game against Sri Lanka and learning more about my batting, making sure I’m giving it 100 per cent when I’m at the crease, I’ll be satisfied with that.”
