Ishan Kishan celebrated his debut for Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) by hitting his maiden IPL century, off just 45 balls, to help his side post 286 for 6 in their IPL 2025 opener against Rajasthan Royals (RR) at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Uppal.
“I just feel good,” he told the official broadcasters Jiostar. “It [century] was coming. I was hoping for it in the previous years, but it’s good to get it this season. The team is doing well, the environment is very different. I’m just loving everything overall, just let’s try and get a few more innings like this for the team.”
Kishan came into bat at No. 3 on the back of a 45-run opening stand off just 3.1 overs. He was involved in two big partnerships – 85 (off 38 balls) with Travis Head and 72 (off 29 balls) with Nitish Reddy as SRH fell one short of the all-time IPL record which they set last year. They now have four of the five top totals in the IPL.
Kishan, who was bought for INR 11.25 crore at the auction, credited Pat Cummins for giving him and the entire team “a lot of freedom” to play a fearless and ultra-aggressive brand of cricket that head coach Daniel Vettori said they’ll continue to exhibit.
“The skipper, he’s giving a lot of freedom to everyone,” Kishan said. “Doesn’t matter if you get a lot of runs or if you get out early. Until and unless you’re doing everything for the team, it’s all fair. That’s the confidence every player in the team needs, so hats off to him and the management.”
Kishan spoke of drawing confidence from the way Abhishek Sharma and Head started and underlined their plans of targeting RR’s key bowlers straightaway. He finished unbeaten on 106 off just 47 balls – his century is the third-fastest for SRH, behind Travis Head (41 balls) and David Warner (43 balls).
“When Abhishek and Head started, they gave a lot of confidence to us batters in the dugout,” Kishan said. “Credit goes to them also. Whenever you get such good starts, you just have to go. You can take a few balls if you want.
“It gives a lot of benefit to the No. 3 and No. 4 batters [in getting their eye in]. Credit goes to them. The pitch was really good, we were just trying to get them under pressure at any point of time, trying to get all their best bowlers to bowl around the 12-13th over, so that worked our way.”
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