NAGPUR: It's raining good news for Yash Thakur. A day after he grabbed his first 5-wicket haul in First Class cricket, the pacer has been picked up by Lucknow Super Giants for IPL 2023 on Friday.
The pacer has been rewarded for his white-ball performance in the recently concluded Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 Trophy that caught the attention of many IPL franchises.
The 23-year-old's base price was Rs20 lakh and he got picked for Rs45 lakh. The pacer was one of the leading death-over pacers in the T20s. Thakur had single-handedly won two crucial SMAT games by defending 11 runs against Uttarakhand in a group game, and 9 runs against star-studded Delhi in the quarterfinals, both in the last over. He was Vidarbha's highest wicket-taker and 5th highest in SMAT with 15 wickets.
This is not the first season when Thakur gave glimpses of his white-ball flair. In the last season's Vijay Hazare Trophy one-dayers, he was the leading wicket-taker in the country with 18 wickets. Since then, Thakur has worked more on his fitness as well as his batting.
He is the only player from Vidarbha who was picked by a franchise in the mini auction on Friday. There were seven more Vidarbha players in the auction list.
Thakur made his List-A debut for Vidarbha in the 2016–17 Vijay Hazare Trophy in 2017. In the very next season, he made his First-Class debut for Vidarbha in 2018–19.
