Smashing centuries in the Indian Premier League (IPL) is no mean feat but doing it in your fourth game in the competition has to be an achievement in itself. Harry Brook did so against the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) after scoring just 29 runs in the first three matches of the competition.
Promoted up the order was a boon for the batter, as he used his baseball AND bazball prowess to take the KKR pacers to the cleaners. With a heavy price tag of Rs 13.25 Crores, there comes a certain level of expectations among the fans and if not achieved, they begin trolling the players unnecessarily. With a Test average of 80.90, the talent was always there but he needed time to settle into the groove of the league.
Now having gotten a century, Brook revealed that he was under pressure in the first few matches of the tournament, but now he is glad to have silenced his online critics.
"I was putting pressure on myself a little bit after the first few games. You go on social media and people are calling you rubbish. You start to doubt yourself a little bit. I just went out there with an 'I don't care' mentality tonight and thankfully it came off. There are a lot of Indian fans out there who'll say 'well done' tonight. But they were slagging me off a few days ago. Glad I could shut them up, to be honest," Brook said during the post-match presentation.
In the first two matches, he was sent down the batting order and only managed 16 runs. Against the Punjab Kings (PBKS), he was brought up the order to open the batting but once again, despite showing signs of his prowess, he was dismissed for 13 runs. But then came the match against the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and an exceptional 55-ball 100 completely turned the attention away from the disappointment of the first three matches.
Normally, this would enrage the propagators of Strike Rate in T20 cricket, but Brook justified this performance when he let his skipper Aiden Markram take on the spinners. Then came the over of Lockie Ferguson, where Brook smashed one maximum and four boundaries. Brook continued his blitzkrieg and completed his century in the 20th over.
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