Vaibhav Suryavanshi, 15, becomes youngest to play international against New Zealand, breaks Tendulkar mark

The second match of the five-match series between India and New Zealand was played in Christchurch. Indian captain Shreyas Iyer won the toss and chose to bowl first. At the toss, he said young batter Vaibhav Suryavanshi would replace Ishan Kishan in the playing eleven.

There had been demands for several matches to include Vaibhav in the playing eleven. The team management had said he would have to wait for his chance. In today's match, he got the opportunity in place of Ishan Kishan. Vaibhav could not make an impact, getting out for 4 off 8 balls. Even so, he added another record to his name as soon as he took the field.

Vaibhav is on his first tour of New Zealand with the Indian team. He had not been included in the playing eleven for the first T20 match. In that match, Ishan Kishan suffered an injury to his thigh. The BCCI then announced that he would not play the second T20 match. Vaibhav was given the chance to bat at number three in his place. Suryavanshi is now the youngest player to play an international match against New Zealand. He did so at the age of 15 years 211 days.

Vaibhav has broken the record of Bangladesh's Mohammad Sharif. Sharif played the Hamilton Test on December 18, 2001, when he was 16 years 6 days old. Aakib Javed also played in New Zealand, at the age of 16 years 185 days. For India, the record earlier belonged to Sachin Tendulkar, who made his debut against New Zealand at 16 years 284 days. Having broken all these records, Vaibhav is now at the top.

The year 2026 has gone well for Vaibhav so far. He showed brilliant form in the IPL, which earned him a place in the Indian T20 team. He made his debut in England, but his performance there was not particularly effective. The tour of Zimbabwe proved an important milestone for him, where he hit two half-centuries.

Vaibhav has not yet made a debut on Indian soil. He did not get a chance in the three-match T20 series against Afghanistan. India recently played a five-match T20 series against the West Indies, in which he had to sit on the bench for all the matches. Vaibhav has so far played eight T20 internationals for India, scoring 246 runs with a highest score of 81.

India's playing eleven was: Sanju Samson (wicketkeeper), Abhishek Sharma, Vaibhav Suryavanshi, Shreyas Iyer (captain), Tilak Varma, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Naman Dhir, Axar Patel, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Arshdeep Singh and Prince Yadav.