I'm really grateful and blessed – Yashasvi Jaiswal on his match-winning century

Yashasvi Jaiswal registered his first ODI century last night as he spearheaded India’s charge against the Proteas, in the process becoming the sixth Indian to register a ton in all three formats of the sport. More importantly, he was finally able to break free from the shackles of ordinary after missing out on playing big knocks in the first two games.

Jaiswal secured the Player of the Match award for his scintillating century. Talking at the post-match presentation, Jaiswal opened up on his emotions about hammering his first ODI ton while underlining his gameplan. He also explained why he didn’t go all guns blazing in what was a knock to savour for the youngster. Jaiswal said that he was ‘really grateful and blessed’ to score his maiden ODI century.

Revealing his discussions with Rohit Sharma in the center, Jaiswal said, “We have been chatting a lot about how we can play and how we can set the target and what tempo we can play. So, I'm trying to understand. I had starts in the last two games but I couldn't convert. So, we have been speaking about how we can convert this and how we balance this inning. I was just thinking how I can balance the inning. So, sometimes I need to be attacking and sometimes I was thinking, okay, maybe I'll take a single or I'll run the game. So, that was my plan and it was pretty good.”

Explaining why he took his aggression down by a notch, Jaiswal added, “I have to control my thoughts on where I can play, what shot I can play and how I can play as deep as possible. And with keeping that in my mind that if it requires, I need to go after the bowlers.”

He concluded by talking about his partnership with Virat Kohli, stating, “Virat paaji, the minute he came, he started playing a lot of shots and we kept chatting as well. He kept giving me small targets that I need to focus on. So, it was helping me towards my goal as well. So, I really enjoyed it.”