Wanindu Hasaranga has been on our radar for a long time: Mike Hesson

From becoming the youngest player to take a hat-trick on ODI debut to helping Sri Lanka register a historic T20I series win against India recently, Wanindu Hasaranga has had a meteoric rise in international cricket. Following his exceptional performance against India in the recently concluded T20I series, he has risen to the No.2 spot in the ICC T20I bowler rankings.

After constantly making waves in international cricket, his maiden IPL call-up seemed inevitable. The Sri Lankan was drafted by the Royal Challengers Bangalore as a replacement for Australia’s Adam Zampa, who opted out of the tournament due to personal reasons. 

Speaking to the Hindustan Times, Mike Hesson revealed that the leg-spinner had been on RCB's radar for quite a long time.

“We have a scouting program that has been in place for the last two years where we know almost every player that is playing cricket around the world at a decent level. Wanindu had been on our radar for a long time. In fact, we needed a replacement in the last IPL, he was certainly the person we called upon. It’s not a recency factor,” Mike Hesson added.

Hesson will take over as head coach for the second phase of the IPL 2021 after Simon Katich decided to skip the remainder of the season due to personal reasons.

The newly-appointed head coach believes Wanindu Hasaranga’s inclusion will append versatility and depth to the unit. 

"We are not surprised by his success in recent times, but he has been doing it for a while. We like his skillset, and we like the fact that he is a multi-skilled cricketer. So, he offers us the ability to bat a little bit deeper as well if we choose to play the overseas spinner along with Chahal. And that gives us a lot of exciting options so the fact that he performed well against India in recent times is great, but certainly not surprising” he said.

The second phase of IPL 2021 will resume with the clash between Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians on September 19. We resume our campaign against Kolkata Knight Riders on September 20 at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi. 

[Hindustan Times input]