RR captain Sanju Samson reveals why they acquired 13-year-old Vaibhav Suryavanshi at the IPL 2025 mega auction

Vaibhav Suryavanshi became the youngest player to be bought at the IPL 2025 auction.

Prior to the 2025 Indian Premier League (IPL) season, Rajasthan Royals captain Sanju Samson had nothing but praise for 13-year-old Vaibhav Suryavanshi. Samson stated on AB de Villiers’ YouTube channel that the management wanted to get Suryavanshi on board after seeing him bat against Australia in the U19 test match.Earlier in October 2024, Vaibhav Suryavanshi made his debut with the quickest century scored by an Indian in U19 tests. He played his first red-ball encounter for the India Under-19 team at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, smashing a century in just 58 balls. This was after no other batter in either side managed a fifty in the match. Suryavanshi’s ton was only behind Moeen Ali’s 56-ball century for England U19s.

Thanks to this exploits, Rajasthan Royals decided to splurge 1.10 crores on Vaibhav Suryavanshi at the IPL 2025 mega auction.

I had seen his highlights: Sanju Samson says its RR franchise’s history on purchasing young talent

Speaking well of the player, Sanju claimed that Rajasthan had a proven track record of identifying and developing youthful potential into world-beaters. Samson praised the team culture and cited Yashasvi Jaiswal, Riyan Parag, and Dhruv Jurel as examples.

“I have seen his highlights. All of the people in the Rajasthan decision-making group saw him bat at the U19 Test match vs Australia in Chennai, where he scored a hundred of 60-70 balls. The shots that he played there, it felt like, that’s something special and we felt like we have to have those kind of individuals in the side and see where they go,” Sanju Samson told AB de Villiers in an interview.

He spoke of names like Riyan Parag, Yashasvi Jaiswal and more and said that it was RR’s tendency to buy young talent and nurture them.

“But Rajasthan Royals have a history of doing this. They find out talents and make them champions. For example, there is a Yashasvi Jaiswal who came to RR as a youngster and now is a rockstar of the Indian team. There is Riyan Parag, Dhruv Jurel – they all fall under that line. I think RR loves that kind of thing – yes, we want to win the IPL, but we also want to make sure that we are giving enough champions to Indian cricket. It will be exciting to meet him,” he further added.

Suryavanshi, 13, has been performing admirably in domestic cricket. The batsman has now made history as the youngest Indian player to play List-A cricket, having made his Ranji Trophy debut with Bihar the previous season.

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