For the longest time, Rishabh Pant’s cricketing instincts were treated with suspicion.
Pundits winced when Pant reverse-swept James Anderson in Ahmedabad. Critics gasped when he scooped Pat Cummins in Sydney. When he fell over playing paddle sweeps in Tests, some labelled it immature and irresponsible.
But at Headingley on Saturday, as Pant swept, fell, and scooped his way to a brilliant 134, Sachin Tendulkar tweeted.
“Rishabh's falling paddle sweep is not accidental. It is intentional and extremely clever,” the Master wrote. “Going down with the shot allows him to get under the ball and scoop it over leg slip with control.”
It was a moment of recognition that Pant wasn’t being reckless. He knew exactly what he was doing. And the man with over 30,000 and 100 hundreds acknowledged it.
The falling paddle sweep, often played on one knee, with the body collapsing as the bat guides the ball fine, has been part of Pant’s arsenal for years. It’s a shot he turns to when fielders crowd the leg side, when spinners loop it just outside off, when the scoreboard demands invention.
Until now, it was often dismissed as too risky, too Pant.
Saturday proved otherwise. England had Shoaib Bashir bowling with a leg slip. Pant saw it, read the field, and pulled out the paddle, going down with the shot to lift it over the cordon. He didn’t just beat the field; he beat the perception.
Tendulkar also picked up on another layer of craft.
“Shubman and Rishabh were speaking loudly in Hindi between deliveries,” he wrote. “They were playing mind games with the bowler, trying to disrupt his rhythm.”
These are things that don’t show up in highlight reels. The shots do. The soundbites don’t. But a great like Tendulkar noticed.
Pant eventually got out to Josh Tongue, but not before delivering a performance of intelligence wrapped in aggression. His knock wasn’t only about the runs, but the statement — that innovation in cricket isn’t childish. It’s genius in disguise.