NEW CHANDIGARH: Sunrisers Hyderabad assistant coach James Franklin hailed Vaibhav Sooryavanshi as a generational talent on Wednesday after the Rajasthan Royals teenager smashed 97 off 29 balls to power his side to victory in their Indian Premier League eliminator.
The 15-year-old also broke Chris Gayle's record for most sixes in an IPL season, taking his tally to 65 in the match and surpassing the former West Indies captain's 59 set in 2012.
Sooryavanshi's performance helped Rajasthan secure a 47-run win that kept their hopes of reaching the final alive, and Franklin said his potential was frightening.
"I don't think anyone's ever seen a talent like this. It's freakish what he's doing at the moment," he told reporters. "To think that he's potentially got 25 years left in the career, it's quite scary.
"He's only going to get better, stronger and more mature with how he bats. So, it's just devastating at the moment."
The season's leading run-scorer struck 12 sixes in his innings, including three in a row off Hyderabad captain Pat Cummins, but fell short of Gayle's mark for the fastest IPL century (30 balls).
Sooryavanshi, who last year hit the first ball he faced of his IPL career for a six aged 14 and later became the youngest player to score a Twenty20 hundred, has amassed 680 runs this season at a strike rate of 242.85.
"There's a very small margin where you could bowl to him," Franklin said. "He's an amazing talent that he can start playing around with it (bowling variations) and then start to cause the bowlers to have to go to other places, which tend to then go back into his strength."
Rajasthan will play Gujarat Titans in the second qualifier on Friday, with the winner advancing to Sunday's final against defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru.