Chennai Super Kings batting coach Michael Hussey reckons talented Sameer Rizvi can play Ambati Rayudu’s role for the franchise in the upcoming season. Rayudu was able to deliver the goods in the middle order and did a fine job for the team.
Meanwhile, CSK signed Rizvi for a whopping amount of INR 8.4 crores in the IPL 2024 mini-auction. Rizvi took the UPT20 league by storm last year, scoring 455 runs in 10 matches at an average of over 50, with two centuries and a half-century.
Speaking at the inauguration of the Pavit Singh Nayar Memorial inter-college T20 tournament at Guru Nanak College in Chennai, Hussey said, “Most definitely. I think he can definitely play that role. I mean Ambati Rayudu is someone that has so much experience and he’s played for so long. So, he’s a seasoned campaigner, whereas Rizvi is just starting out in his IPL career.”
“So, we can’t expect Rizvi to be doing exactly what Rayudu has been doing for so many years. But, of course, we can start developing him and he’s got a lot of natural ability. So, it’s exciting. It’s exciting to see how far he can go,” Hussey added.
Rizvi has played only 11 List-A matches in his career, scoring 205 runs at an average of 29.28. Hussey revealed Rizvi will bat in the middle order.
“I think he’ll bat somewhere in the middle-order. He’s obviously a natural striker of the ball. I only saw him for the first time yesterday. He looks a very talented young prospect. So, I’m looking forward to working with him personally and just helping him improve his game, obviously for this tournament, but also for the years moving forward. We want him to do well in this IPL, but there’s much more years left in his career,” said Hussey.
Chennai Super Kings will begin their IPL 2024 campaign against Royal Challengers Bangalore at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai on March 22.
CSK IPL 2024 SQUAD
MS Dhoni (c), Moeen Ali, Deepak Chahar, Devon Conway, Tushar Deshpande, Shivam Dube, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Rajvardhan Hangargekar, Ravindra Jadeja, Ajay Mandal, Mukesh Choudhary, Matheesha Pathirana, Ajinkya Rahane, Shaik Rasheed, Mitchell Santner, Simarjeet Singh, Nishant Sindhu, Prashant Solanki, Maheesh Theekshana, Rachin Ravindra, Shardul Thakur, Daryl Mitchell, Sameer Rizvi, Mustafizur Rahman, Avanish Rao Aravelly.
