Suryakumar Yadav has spoken openly about the months since he led India to the T20 World Cup title in March, and he has described the time since as very difficult. The 36-year-old was speaking at a Mumbai Cricket Association event on 10 November, where he said honesty about the period mattered more than pretending it had been easy. He captained India to the title in Ahmedabad in March, then lost the captaincy and his place in the side after a poor Indian Premier League season. Suryakumar Yadav said the months that followed tested him in a way the title win had not.
The fall came quickly. After the World Cup win, Suryakumar Yadav scored 270 runs in 13 innings in the IPL at an average of 20.76, and Mumbai Indians finished second from bottom. The selectors then removed him as captain and left him out of the squad for the tours of Ireland and England, handing the leadership to Shreyas Iyer. Suryakumar Yadav played only local club games and the Mumbai T20 League after that, and he missed the Ranji Trophy because he had too little red-ball preparation behind him.
He did not hide how hard the change felt. “Post the T20 World Cup win, it has been a little difficult. I don’t want to run away from that fact. If you are not honest with yourself, it is very difficult to lead a happy life. So, to be very honest, it has been very difficult,” he said at the Mumbai event. The words were plain, and they matched the tone of the rest of his remarks, in which he said the first two months after the IPL were the hardest part of the period.
Family changed the shape of those months. During the IPL, Suryakumar Yadav and his wife Devisha welcomed a baby girl, born on 7 May, and he said his focus moved to her at once. “The focus shifted completely towards her. The last few months, since she was born, have been very beautiful,” he said. The arrival gave him a reason to step back from the game for a time, and he said the months at home helped him see the rest of his career more clearly.
Suryakumar Yadav on the talk with his wife
The turning point came in a conversation at home. Suryakumar Yadav sat down with Devisha and talked through the months since the World Cup, and she told him to look back at the player he had been at 15. “She said the same thing: I think you need to bring back the love and passion for the game that you had when you were a 15-year-old kid who wanted to represent Mumbai in the Under-15 age group,” he said. He took the advice and went back to the training habits of his early years, working on the same routines he had followed a decade earlier.
He said the change has worked. “So that’s what I started thinking about. And I am following the same approach now that I did 10-15 years ago, training again and pursuing the same passion and love for the game. Everything is back to normal now,” he said. The return to old habits gave him a clear aim again: to win games for Mumbai and to win the championship for the state side, the same goal he had set himself as a teenager.
Suryakumar Yadav to lead Mumbai in Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy
The next step is a return to competitive cricket as captain of Mumbai in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, which starts on 14 November. Suryakumar Yadav will lead the side in the tournament, and Mumbai open against Hyderabad at Eden Gardens in Kolkata. The appointment gives him a team to lead again, in the domestic competition where he first made his name, and it comes eight months after he lifted the World Cup as India captain.
There is also a personal landmark in reach. Suryakumar Yadav needs 271 more runs to become the third Indian batter to reach 10,000 runs in T20 cricket, counting T20 internationals and domestic matches. The figure sits in the background while he works on form and fitness in Mumbai colours, and the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy gives him the games to chase it. He has said his main goal is the one he set as a boy: win games for Mumbai and win the championship for Mumbai.