Understanding Riyan Parag through his close people’s eyes

Understanding Riyan Parag through his close people’s eyes

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Riyan Parag had it easy. After all, his father is a reputed First-Class cricketer and his mother was a former national-level swimmer, who represented India at the Asian Championships in a decade-long career. As far as the fact of inspiration goes, Riyan didn’t have to go far ahead for it.

However, if the old perceive that “genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration” has any relevance in the modern-day cricket, then there was no doubt that Riyan gave his all to reach where he is right now. As the chance beckoned, he played a confident 43-run innings knock in the company of Steve Smith to take Rajasthan Royals over the line against Mumbai Indians after a top-order batting collapse. This effort was enough to earn Smith's praise as the skipper commented that Riyan is a “quick learner” and will “do well in the future”. 

Smith couldn’t be farther from the truth, at least, those who have seen his innings last night would attest to his. During his 29-ball stay in the middle, Parag never undermined himself and was not bogged down by the pressure exerted by the hostile Mumbai pacers led by Lasith Malinga and Jasprit Bumrah. In the 16th over of the innings, Malinga bowled a yorker length delivery and the ball took a puff of dust before eventually sneaking past Parag, leaving him clueless on how to tackle that kind of delivery. 

In that moment of hard reality, you expect a 17-year-old, playing only the second IPL match of his career, to lose his nerves and shift defensive mode instantly. Not Parag though as on the very next ball, he stepped away from the line and slapped the good length ball inside-out over extra cover for a boundary. 

It is often said that the way a cricketer approaches his game reflects on his conduct off the field as well. A calm and composed teenager, Parag perched this theory and quickly rose through the ranks to be the second cricketer from Assam to represent an IPL team. And this was attested by the person, who knows Parag inside out, his mother, in an exclusive chat with SportsCafe.

“Riyan is always very calm and doesn’t stress himself out by overthinking about anything. I’ve always focused to give him the support that he wants, but from a very young age, we made him understand the importance of self-belief and confidence. We know, he will never be satisfied with this and go on to do well in his life,” Mithu Baruah uttered those words with full confidence, belying the motherly love and the overflow of emotions after his son made his IPL debut.

When asked if she distributed sweets among his neighbours after his son got a chance to make his debut for Rajasthan Royals, she quickly added, “No. Why would I? It is just the beginning. We know he has a long way to go and this is nothing. We can’t get excited just because he made his debut in the IPL. 

“Now he has to settle himself in the IPL arena. I was in Jaipur when he made his debut and even met everyone in the Royals team after his debut. They were very confident that Riyan has a good future ahead of him.” 

In a day and age, where an IPL contract is a symbol of achievement, and the representation of the changing ambitions of Indian cricket, it was refreshing to see Baruah being so down to earth. She believes that this is just the beginning, which probably came from her experience of representing the country at the highest level in her preferred sport and herself marrying to a cricketer who had a fairly successful 15-year stint in the Ranji Trophy for Assam and Railways. 

Gokul Sharma, Assam Ranji Captain, attested to Baruah’s sentiment and added, “Riyan is never the one to take the short cut. I have played with his father for a long time and have seen Riyan’s growth as a cricketer and a teenager since he was a kid.”

Gokul wanted to talk about Riyan further when I interrupted him to ask about how happy he was when he saw his teammate bowling the first ball in front of the packed crowd. That was enough to extract an emotional reaction from normally composed Gokul, who has his team scampering from the bottom of the plate team to be the Ranji semi-finalist in the 2015-16 season.

“When Riyan came to the side, we all welcomed him with open arms. That is the team cultures we have been able to imbibe in the last four years, supports each other well. Everyone was supportive of Riyan and he gelled well to the team unit very soon even though he was only 15.

“While he deserves all the credit for his success, the real credit goes to his parents. Whenever I go to his house, I see riyan always practising with his father. In Assam, we don’t have the best of the facilities, but his father made Riyan a hard-working individual and never let him realise the lack of facilities in his state,” Gokul said before adding that “You will see one day, Riyan will go a long way in his career.”

Cricket, like many sports, loves a good prodigy story as the unruined youth is the promise of new ideas and perspectives. Life may have some connotations and there will be a lot of challenges for him as he moves on in his life. But as far as the matter of distributing sweets is concerned, a lot will depend on how he approaches his cricket now. 

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