MUMBAI: Sometimes, one innings or spell can change a cricketer's life. In the case of young 'keeper-batter Dhruv Jurel, who stroked a superb 90 against England in the fourth Test against England at Ranchi and has impressed with both his batting and ‘keeping since his debut at Rajkot during the series, it was a six over extra cover that he hit while appearing for the Rajasthan Royals trials at the franchise's High Performance Centre in Talegaon in 2022 that prompted RR to buy him at the auction that year.
While he had played for the India Under-19 team, Jurel was yet to turn out for Uttar Pradesh in domestic cricket till then. The stint with RR changed Jurel's life, as he shot into the limelight with a few impressive performances in the high-profile T20 league last year.
In a chat with TOI, RR high performance director Zubin Bharucha revealed that it was Rajasthan Royals and UP pacer "Kartik Tyagi who sent Jurel to the RR trials." "He hadn’t played for UP that season or played any representative cricket."
Barucha revealed that it was that one shot that Jurel hit in the trials that convinced him that his franchise should go for him in the auction, even as RR’s selection team was initially confusing him with Aryan Juyal, another UP player who had appeared for the trials along with Dhruv.
"I remember him hitting this one ball over extra cover for an enormous six and thought this looked different and special. Another boy by the name A (Aryan) Juyal was also batting well for UP that season and was at the same trial. Both looked impressive, but we felt that Dhruv had a little X factor about him, despite not playing any state cricket that year. Even our own RR selection team was confused which player we were going after. But I requested them to check the video of the guy who hit that six over extra cover and they came back saying it was Dhruv Jurel. I was very clear that’s the one RR should be chasing after, come auction day," Bharucha remembered.
Bharucha recalled that Jurel looked "effortless" behind the stumps in the trials. "He kept for a very brief time in the trials and looked effortless. As soon as RR picked him the work began, he was an unbelievably committed student and willing to work to the point of physical and mental exhaustion to learn his craft," Bharucha praised.
After he impressed in the IPL, many thought that Jurel was more of a white-ball specialist, but the 22-year-old had been training for all the formats of the game. "We have been preparing for the last 18 months taking the version (T20, ODI’s or Tests) out of the equation and the practice and merely focusing on the how and where runs can be scored," Bharucha said, before throwing light on how he prepared the young gun for his debut Test series.
"Just before this Test series, he came to the RR HPC in Talegaon and batted for 140 overs in a day, it took over four hours on different spinning surfaces. It was a monumental practice session, one of the few that matched (Yashasvi) Jaiswal’s long sessions."
"RR now have a bunch of boys all trying to outdo each other's sessions, with Riyan Parag also following the same principles and matching Samson, Jaiswal and Jurel stoke-for-stroke. After the session with Jurel, the talk was simply around how to go down to the level of our practices and execute the same in the Test match," concluded Bharucha.
