Samson — extraordinarily gifted, frustratingly inconsistent

An enigma? A mystery? An unfathomable riddle, an uncrackable puzzle?

Sanju Samson is all this and more. He is extraordinarily gifted, yet frustratingly inconsistent. When he gets going, he makes batting look the easiest proposition in the world but especially of late, he has struggled to make any sort of impact.

So dangerously close to becoming the perennial nearly man of Indian cricket, the muscular right-hander from Kerala finally seemed to be coming into his own with a string of breakout knocks in Twenty20 Internationals. Between October and November 2024, Samson unleashed three silken centuries in five innings, at home against Bangladesh and away in South Africa, to finally get the monkey off his back.

But with Samson, nothing has been straightforward ever, so why should it be any different this time around?

Struggles against pace

Just as he was beginning to find his calling as an opener came five cheap dismissals against England at home, in January 2025. That he managed only 51 runs in that series with a highest of 26 was worrying in itself, but even more concerning was the manner of his dismissals. On each instance, he was caught on the pull, against Jofra Archer and Mark Wood mainly, suggesting that even on docile surfaces, the short ball at great pace was a bit of an Achilles’ heel.

But that isn’t uncommon, is it? No batter in his right mind and who is nothing if not truthful will state with any honesty that he relishes the bouncer-barrage, that he is entirely at home when his throat and head are in the firing line. At least Samson knew what the problem area was, what he needed to work on; he and the think-tank should also have taken encouragement from the fact that there aren’t too many bowlers in the world in the same pace league as Archer and Wood who are representing their countries in 20-over internationals.

Between the end of that England series — Samson broke his finger in the final game in Mumbai, which forced him to play the early IPL matches for Rajasthan Royals as a pure batter – and the start of September, Samson sat on the outer as India mounted a grand, unbeaten campaign at the 50-over Champions Trophy in March and came away from England with honours shared 2-2 in Shubman Gill’s first outing as the new Test skipper. Gill led from the front admirably, smashing numerous records on his way to 754 breathtaking runs, whose impact stretched far beyond merely keeping the Indian flag flying in England.

With Rohit Sharma having retired from Test cricket in May – which paved the way for Gill’s installation as the next leader – the decision-makers felt the time was ripe to remove the Mumbaikar from the captaincy of the 50-over side as well. Even though the next ODI World Cup was some 25 months at the time, Ajit Agarkar’s selection panel bit the bullet in October, elevating Gill to the captaincy of the longer short-ball format while resurrecting his T20I career, which had gone into cold storage for more than a year.

By not just bringing him back into the T20I setup but also appointing him Suryakumar Yadav’s deputy, the selectors had left the leadership group, of which Gill was an integral part, with no option but to play the Punjab batter in the T20I XI. While Gill stuttered and stumbled and was eventually put out of his misery when he was dropped from the 15 that will start the defence of India’s T20 World Cup crown in a week’s time, his original inclusion in the 20-over playing XI meant Samson had to be sacrificed at the top of the order.

And so, at the Asia Cup in the Emirates in September, which was the vehicle for Gill’s comeback to the format, Samson was dropped down the order. It’s not as if Samson was a stranger to batting in the middle order – on his T20I debut itself in July 2015, he slotted in at No. 7 – but his most influential hands, for country and franchise, had come at the top of the order. By sacrificing him to accommodate Gill – Abhishek Sharma had already made himself indispensable as an opener by then – the message to Samson seemed clear: If you entertain ambitions of continuing to represent the country, develop the skills required to come good against an older ball, with fewer overs left in the innings.

Samson didn’t seem at home in the middle-order, though in his first hit at the Asia Cup, he made 56 against Oman in Abu Dhabi. It was a patchy, scratchy, almost laborious hand; the lack of pace in the Oman bowling didn’t help, but early indications were that the Samson experiment in the middle-order wasn’t going to work.

Losing his spot

Unsurprisingly, as he continued to struggle to come to grips with his new role, he lost his place to Jitesh Sharma, clearly the more acknowledged and pedigreed end-overs strike-force. It seemed oh-so-unfair, especially because Gill was hardly setting the world afire as an opener. Perhaps out of stubborn mule-headedness, or because they still believed Gill was one hit away from rediscovering his mojo, India’s selectors kept investing in the younger man from Punjab until they could no longer afford to do so.

And so, for the five-match series against New Zealand, India’s last tango before the World Cup, Gill was dumped from the larger squad and Samson picked, as opening partner to Abhishek. The wheel had come a full circle; Samson and Ishan Kishan, the little bundle of electric energy from Jharkhand, were selected as the two designated wicketkeeper-batters in the World Cup 15, with the clear message that India would open with one of them and Abhishek in the interest of team balance at the tournament.

Having gone from the middle-order to the top, returned to the middle-order and then been pushed back up to the top, all in the space of 18 months, Samson hasn’t had a single score of substance against the Kiwis. Four knocks have yielded a frugal 40 runs; in that is one golden duck (it ought to have been two had Devon Conway not put him down off the first ball of India’s chase of 209 in the second match in Raipur) and a best of 24 on Wednesday when, in Visakhapatnam, Samson showed fluency for the first time in a long while.

While Samson’s graph has shown an alarming downslide, Kishan has been emphatically making his case after being given an unexpected opportunity to showcase his wares. It was an unspoken (in public) understanding that Samson would be the first-choice stumper and Kishan his understudy at the start of the World Cup, at the very least, when the squad was named five weeks back. But a medical condition that necessitated surgery put Tilak Varma out of commission before the Kiwi bash, which in a roundabout sort of way accorded the team management the chance to give Kishan international game-time before the World Cup.

A force of nature

Kishan is a force of nature, who knows no fear, who doesn’t have a single negative bone in his body. After a tepid start in Nagpur, he tore the Kiwis to shreds in Raipur on his way to a 21-ball half-century. He again made a blazing contribution in the next outing in Guwahati when India hunted down 154 with an incredible 60 deliveries to spare. The contrast in fortunes, approach and outcome wasn’t lost on anyone watching. Samson needed to pull up his socks immediately if the captain-coach combine of Suryakumar and Gautam Gambhir, who have incessantly backed him despite yo-yoing him around, were not to lose patience.

Now, the 31-year-old has just one more meaningful opportunity to show that the faith invested in him is not misplaced. Sunday in Thiruvananthapuram beckons; a full house will be unabashedly cheering for the son of the soil to come good so that he stays in the hunt to start the World Cup against United States in Mumbai on February 7. Kishan missed the defeat in Visakhapatnam with a ‘niggle’ – how annoying that injuries have to be accorded the status of national secrets not to be divulged – and one isn’t sure how serious the said injury is. But irrespective of whether the little left-hander is fit or not, it is more or less certain that Samson will continue to feature in the playing group. It’s up to Samson now to stand up and be counted. Another failure will push him to the very brink.

When the World Cup squad was announced, Suryakumar broke from recent convention and admitted that the left-right combination was overrated, which would indicate that India aren’t averse to opening with two left-handers, Abhishek and Kishan, should the need arise. There is nothing to choose between Samson and Kishan when it comes to glovework, even if the former has shown himself to be prone to lapses in concentration and silly errors. At the end of the day, form will dictate which one of them gets the nod, which in itself is a win for Kishan, who wasn’t in the scheme of things until very recently when India were looking at their wicketkeeper to play in the middle order.

Through sheer weight of performances in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, including in the final when he made a title-winning century for Jharkhand, Kishan has forced the deciding authorities to resurrect an international career that seemed to have hit a roadblock following his return home from South Africa in the middle of a long tour in December 2023 citing the need for a break from the game. His own sustained telling touch, coupled with Samson’s fumbling returns, have opened up a race that didn’t seem possible even a month back. Now, the pressure is on the older, more experienced and more battle-worn protagonist to respond. Sunday will be a huge test of Samson’s skills, undoubtedly, but also his character and resolve. The whole cricket-invested country will be watching with interest, millions egging the hometown hero on with so much at stake in what essentially is a dead rubber.