Pujara Urges Young India Batters To Build Technique

Fame arrives in Indian cricket before a player has finished unpacking his kit bag.

One good IPL season, one fearless knock, one viral clip, and a teenager can become a household name. Cheteshwar Pujara knows the other side of that story. He built his career not on noise, but on patience, repeatability and trust.

Now, as a new crop of young Indian players enters the spotlight, Pujara has a simple warning. Popularity comes quickly in cricket. Keeping that respect takes a much stronger base.

Pujara’s warning for young stars

Pujara’s message is aimed at players such as Vaibhav Suryavanshi and Ayush Mhatre, who represent India’s latest wave of batting talent.

He said young players must first build a solid foundation. That sounds old-fashioned in the T20 age, but it is not. Even in a 20-over game, technique matters. Shot-making alone cannot carry a player for 5 seasons.

Pujara pointed out that modern cricket gives opponents too much information. Teams study old videos, spot patterns and plan dismissals. If a batter has one clear weakness, analysts will find it.

That is why early success can become a trap. A young player may dominate one season. Next season, every bowling unit comes prepared. The real test starts after the first burst of applause.

Pujara said Vaibhav has done well over the last 2 years. But if he keeps producing strong seasons for the next 5 years, he can move from promising player to serious long-term cricketer.

That is the hard climb Indian fans sometimes miss. Talent opens the door. Consistency keeps you in the room.

IPL dreams and India’s shirt

Pujara did not dismiss the IPL dream. He knows how important the league has become for money, exposure and pressure training.

But he also reminded young players that India must remain the larger goal. He said they should aim to win trophies for Team India, not only perform for their franchises.

That advice matters because the calendar now never sleeps. There is always a T20 league, a bilateral series, a World Cup cycle, or a selection debate running somewhere.

For a young cricketer, the IPL can feel like the whole universe. Big crowds, big contracts and instant fame can change a life. But international cricket asks different questions.

Can you adjust to conditions abroad? Can you handle a bad patch? Can you bat when the ball is moving? Can you bowl when the pitch gives you nothing?

Pujara’s own career answered many of those questions in Test cricket. He was not built for headlines every evening. He was built for long afternoons when India needed someone to absorb pressure.

That is why his advice carries weight. He is not telling youngsters to reject T20 cricket. He is telling them to use it as a road, not as the final destination.

Selection must stay performance-first

Pujara also touched the most sensitive subject in Indian cricket, selection.

Should senior players keep getting T20 chances when younger players are pushing hard? His answer was balanced, and quite practical.

He said selection should depend on performance. If young players perform better and experienced players keep struggling, selectors must consider new options.

But he also said age alone should not remove a senior player. If an experienced player still performs well, dropping him only because he is older makes little sense.

That is the debate India faces almost every season now. Fans want fresh faces. Broadcasters enjoy new stories. Social media demands quick change after every defeat.

Selection rooms cannot work like that. They need both evidence and timing.

A good T20 side needs energy, but it also needs calm. Young players bring fearlessness. Seniors bring memory. They have seen collapses, hostile crowds and knockout pressure before.

Pujara’s point is simple. India should not worship age, either young or old. It should reward output.

That sounds obvious, but cricket rarely stays obvious for long. Every big player carries reputation. Every rising player carries public excitement. The selectors must separate both from actual form.

Why IPL still helps Tests

Pujara pushed back against the idea that the IPL has damaged Test cricket beyond repair.

He said India has found major red-ball players through the IPL. He named Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj and Mohammed Shami as examples of players who grew through the league and then became important in Tests.

That is a fair point. The IPL does not only produce sloggers. It places young bowlers under extreme pressure against top batters. It exposes domestic players to elite dressing rooms. It teaches them to recover quickly after bad overs.

For fast bowlers, especially, the league can be a harsh but useful school. A yorker missed by 6 inches can disappear into the stands. A slower ball read too early can become a boundary.

That pressure helps players mature. The trick is to make sure skills transfer across formats.

A bowler who learns control in T20 can still use it in Tests. A batter who learns game awareness in the IPL can still grow into a longer-format player. But both need coaching, patience and format-specific work.

Pujara’s larger argument is not that T20 is harmless. It is that Indian cricket must handle it wisely.

The league gives India depth. It creates competition. It brings players from smaller centres into prime time. But it cannot become the only measure of quality.

Mumbai’s slump and league pressure

Pujara also spoke about Mumbai Indians, whose uneven form has drawn attention.

He accepted that Mumbai’s performance had dipped. But he did not treat it as a crisis. He said their win against Lucknow showed they still had the ability to respond.

His view was that Mumbai’s players need to sit together and plan better. Sometimes, players lose form. But once a strong squad finds rhythm, it can become hard to stop.

That line captures the IPL nicely. A team can look lost for 2 weeks, then dangerous again after one clean win.

With 10 teams in the league, Pujara believes competition has become sharper. That matters for Indian cricket. Tight matches expose young players to pressure they cannot learn in the nets.

A 19-year-old defending 12 runs in the final over learns something. A young batter chasing 45 from 18 balls learns something. A fielder dropping a catch in front of 40,000 people also learns something.

Not every lesson feels pleasant. But big cricket rarely offers gentle classrooms.

For ordinary fans, Pujara’s message is worth holding on to. The next Indian star may arrive with a strike rate, a highlight reel and a million followers. But the real story begins after that first wave.

Indian cricket will keep producing famous youngsters. The harder task is producing durable cricketers. That needs coaches, selectors, franchises and families to value patience as much as power. The applause will come quickly. The career will still have to be earned, season after season.