In their fifth match of the 2024/25 Vijay Hazare Trophy, Mumbai took on Nagaland at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad. Having been put in to bat, they scored 403-7 thanks to fifties from Angkrish Raghuvanshi (56) and Shardul Thakur (73*), but the main contribution came from 17-year-old opener Ayush Mhatre.

Mhatre put on 156 for the first wicket with Raghuvanshi, slamming a scarcely believable 181 off 117 balls in what was just his fifth List A match, and 11th senior match. Earlier in the competition, he had scored 78 against Karnataka on his List A debut.

Mhatre's innings meant he broke the world record for the youngest player to register a score of 150 or more in a men's List A match, at the age of just 17 years and 168 days. The previous record had been held by another Mumbai opener, and now India international – Yashasvi Jaiswal who did so at 17 years and 291 days against Jharkhand in 2019.

Who is Ayush Mhatre, Mumbai's latest batting prodigy?

Mumbai has been known for producing some of the best batters – and players – in Indian cricket history. The conveyor belt never seems to stop, and Mhatre is latest one off the line.

In January this year, Mhatre caught the eye with a stellar knock of 145 in the final of the Cooch Behar Trophy against a Karnataka U19 side containing the likes of Samit Dravid and Hardik Raj.

Read more: Unsold in IPL, out of favour India opener smashes three centuries in a row in Vijay Hazare Trophy

He had initially been slated to continue playing for the U19 side this season, but was fast-tracked to the senior side after impressing against Karnataka in a pre-season tournament. After another prodigious young talent, Musheer Khan, suffered an injury in a road accident, Mhatre got his big break, replacing Musheer in the Mumbai lineup for the Irani Trophy in October. He scored 19 & 14 against Rest of India.

After his maiden first-class hundred, a knock of 176 against Maharashtra in the ongoing Ranji Trophy season, Mumbai chief selector Sanjay Patil disclosed that he had discovered Mhatre in the Kanga League, a tournament played during the monsoon season in Mumbai and notoriously famed for making conditions ridiculously difficult for batters. Several Indian cricketers including Dattu Phadkar, Sunil Gavaskar and Sachin Tendulkar have cut their teeth in the Kanga League before playing for the state.

The Shaw connection

Mhatre hails from Virar, the same area of Mumbai as Prithvi Shaw, India's U19 World Cup winning captain in 2018. Shaw was Mhatre's opening partner on first-class debut, and the teenager said that the bat he used to score the century against Maharashtra was given to him by Shaw.

Following his breakout in the Ranji Trophy, Mhatre was called up to India's U19 team for the Asia Cup in late November, and scored two fifties in five innings. Before returning to action with the Mumbai senior team in the Vijay Hazare Trophy, he also played two 50-over matches for the U23 side.

Mhatre's explosive start to life at the domestic level could see him rise swiftly up the ranks, not unlike Shaw. But he would do well to take the senior Virar batter's cheqeuered career so far as a cautionary tale – there's no doubt as to his talent.

Image credit: Instagram / @ayush_m255

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