Suryansh Shedge - in the patient quest to master 'finishing'

There are a lot about his T20 batting that Suryansh Shedge is certain about: his preparation, his mindset, his ambitions. The one thing he isn't certain about is when will he get to bat in a game - with five overs remaining or five balls left? That is assuming, he will get to bat at all.

On good days, Shedge - and his ilk of batters who get slotted in as death-overs specialists in T20s - will get time to knock a couple of balls around before unleashing their powers. On more challenging days, they will be forced to jump in with 10-odd runs required off four balls. On the most testing of days, their turn to bat may never come. He has to wait till the very end to know what's required of him on a game day.

For Mumbai in this Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, he waited five times in vain out of nine games this season. When he did get the odd chance to bat, in some matches, he could have piled on runs like the rest of the teammates did in amassing 200-plus totals. And on one of those days, he could have bailed them out from a top-order collapse. In each of those innings, nonetheless, he failed to leave behind a mark - even as the opportunities came well timed - between the 10th and the 15th over.

It's quite a layered demand for a player like Shedge, who doesn't like to complicate his processes. The destructive powers that make death-over hitters a sought-after commodity in T20 cricket, also slots them into positions that leaves him uncertain. That requirement from his batting means that the biggest strength of his craft - power-hitting - also ends up becoming the greatest bane. He's not alone in this tricky position with his game, where he can be the difference maker with only a few balls.

"The amount of pressure that comes with finishing a game, and the expectations, only we cricketers can feel," Shedge says as he starts off in trying to break down that pressure.

"Obviously you go in to bat in crunch situations, when the team needs you to step up. So sometimes you can get lost and start expecting some things from yourself. When you start doing that, your mind is not focussed on what it should be doing."

Shedge has found solace in the sagacious words of MS Dhoni that he sought after failing to make use of the rare opportunity that came his way last season, when he was sent in as an Impact Substitute in the match against Kolkata Knight Riders. With Punjab Kings having suffered a batting collapse, Shedge walked in to bat at 74 for 5 in the ninth over, he was dismissed for a run-a-ball 4, and the team bundled out for 111.

"That game, when our team was in trouble, I had a lot of expectations of myself," Shedge confessed to Cricbuzz. "I have taken my team out of those situations in domestic games. When I failed to do that that day, I was really disappointed with myself, thinking where did I go wrong."

Two weeks later he met Dhoni, the veteran of finishing in pressure situations, who had a word of advice for the youngster: when you're a finisher, you need to keep your emotions in check. It can't get a high when you've done well, and then go low when you don't.

Those words made sense to Shedge. "That's one change I'm trying to bring in my game, to keep my emotions in control, and not let it fluctuate. If that happens, it clouds your judgement and you don't play with clarity."

But to seed that clarity, Shedge believes, the key lies in preparation: stay calm to birth the chaos. "The calmness and patience you get comes from the preparation," he says. "If your mind is not prepared, you will start to overthink and get hyper. If you've done everything you could, and get on the field with clarity, leaving everything aside and focus on your efforts, that gives you a lot of calmness. That work can only be done at practise. Once you enter the field, you have to let the situation take over and back your instincts."

A natural hard hitter of the ball, Shedge's preparation doesn't necessarily lie in preparing for the big hits. Over the past few months, while training under Jatin Paranjpe, he has opened up a new avatar of his batting. Playing red-ball cricket for the Under-23 Mumbai side, he displayed both sides of his now evolved game - to hold fort as well as to explode.

"My coaches always tell me: look at the scoreboard, because the scoreboard talks to you... When you're put in different situations, clarity is important. If you have clarity, and if you're instinctive, at the end of the day, and if you have the courage to back yourself, you can succeed. I still haven't got a hang of it. It's a journey, it's a constant journey. The thing about opportunity is that it's not in my hands. The only thing in my hands is how I can be the better version of myself."

On Sunday evening, playing in the Indian Premier League, that big day and the big opportunity to make a mark came his way. Having sat out on the bench in the first half of the league stage, he got only his second shot in the middle.

In his first game, he had spent 11 minutes at the crease, but got only two balls to face, allowing his belligerent batting partner Marcus Stoinis to take majority of the strike. But he was posed with a different challenge on Sunday. To arrest the rare top-order slide for Punjab Kings, he walked in to bat in the seventh over. In no time, the scoreboard slipped to 47 for 5. This time, there was no scope to play second fiddle.

He took charge, soaking the pressure and keeping the run-rate moving at a brisk pace. He took down Manav Suthar for 26 runs in five balls, and paved the way for Punjab Kings to reach a respectable - if not winning - total of 163 for 9 with his quickfire half-century.

His performance didn't end up in a match-winning cause. But he will wake up to a new week, hopeful that some day, even in the IPL, the spotlight will be firmly on him. It remains uncertain though what his role that day would look like. Another brisk 57? Or a last ball six? Or something else?

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