When a stress fracture had laid Praful Hinge low two-and-a-half years ago, the young fast bowler couldn’t have afforded the wish of having an IPL contract.
However, the 24-year-old from Nagpur continued to put in the hard yards at the Vidarbha Cricket Association academy, before having a stint at the MRF Pace Foundation in Chennai, and earned a berth in the Vidarbha senior team.
Thereafter, thanks to the backing from former India pacer Varun Aaron, who vouched for his potential before people who matter at Sunrisers Hyderabad, Hinge earned his maiden IPL contract with the franchise at ₹30 lakh during the last auction.
Aaron, also the Sunrisers’ bowling coach at present, wasn’t wrong in his assessment of Hinge by terming him as an “X-factor.” On IPL debut, Hinge did what no one had done before — take three wickets in his (and the innings’) first over.
Hinge’s father, Prakash, believes his son’s hard work at the MRF Pace Foundation under the supervision of Aaron and former Australia pace spearhead Glenn McGrath has worked wonders.
“When Praful was down with the stress fracture and was out of action for quite some time, Prashant Vaidya (who played four ODIs for India) helped him initially at the VCA academy. He then went to the MRF Pace Foundation, where Aaron and McGrath worked a great deal with him, which helped him recover. That was in 2023.
“Fortune too was on Praful’s side as he had the opportunity to go to Brisbane with McGrath a couple of years ago and undergo another round of training there (at Cricket Australia’s National Cricket Centre). He stayed there for around 25 days.
So, obviously, those days were crucial for him,” Prakash, who works at the state electricity board, told The Telegraph from Nagpur on Tuesday.
Well-directed short-pitched stuff and aiming for the area just short of good length is Praful’s way of operation, which earned him the prized scalps of Vaibhav Sooryavanshi and Dhruv Jurel on a surface having good carry. “Bouncers are his strength, and he works very hard on them at the nets,” Vidarbha head coach Usman Ghani pointed out.
He had played just one T20 — Vidarbha’s Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy game against Andhra in Lucknow last December — before Monday’s IPL match. “It was because of our team combination that he couldn’t feature in more T20s,” Ghani stated. “Going forward, though, he’ll certainly be having his share of opportunities as alongside the bouncers, he practises his other variations too.”
Hinge had written it “somewhere” that he would take four-five wickets on his IPL debut. He did it. But his real task begins now, Ghani reminded the youngster.
It’s upon Hinge to show consistency because the IPL often throws up one-game wonders. For a pacer who started playing the sport from the age of 13 and had no idea prior to that as to what leather-ball cricket was, Hinge has come a long way. But his journey shouldn’t end here, it should rather be the beginning.