19-year-old Sam Konstas from New South Wales has become the youngest to score twin-centuries in the same Sheffield Shield game since Ricky Ponting achieved the feat in 1993.
Konstas debuted last November and is playing his fifth first-class game during the Sheffield Shield clash against South Australia. After a quiet start to his senior career, where he averaged 25.83 in six innings with a high score of 57, the teenage opener lived up to Kerry O’Keefe’s prediction of being a star in the future, with scores of 152 and 105 in Sydney. O'Keefe had also floated the idea that Konstas could be now-retired David Warner's replacement in the Test team.
The right-hander was the only batter from NSW to cross 60 in the first innings, making a cautious 152 in 241 deliveries with 13 fours and four sixes. It helped his team post 366 on the board. Later, NSW ended with a 106-run lead, extending it to 389 runs after another Konstas ton in the second innings.
Yet again, he was the standout batter from the innings, with his 105 taking up 225 balls. He reached his ton with a six in the 72nd over, drawing level with Ponting as the only teenager to score hundreds in two innings in a Shield game in nearly 31 years. Ponting was 18 back in 1993 when he achieved the same feat.
Who is Sam Konstas?
He was a member of Australia’s successful under-19 World Cup campaign this year, making 191 runs with a hundred against West Indies after his team had slipped to 28-2. Konstas was the only batter to make more than 30 for Australia in that match.
He is being mentored by Shane Watson and made over 1,000 runs in all formats in his very first season of grade cricket.
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