Prithvi Shaw brought India the U-19 World Cup winning title early this January, followed by selection in the IPL, the Delhi Capitals. The right-handed Mumbai batter made his debut in a cash-rich league against Punjab Kings (formerly Kings XI Punjab) at Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium, scoring 22 runs off just 10 balls. In the next match, against Kolkata Knight Riders again at the same venue, the right-handed batter, only 18 at the time, blazed away to score a strike rate of 62 runs off just 44 balls. That phenomenal knock saw him get a permanent place in the playing XI of DC. He was retained by the famous franchise before the IPL 2022 mega auction.
He played 79 matches for DC in the last seven seasons and scored 1,892 runs in the IPL. But then, he wasn’t retained ahead of the mega auction of IPL 2025. In the two-day auction held in Jeddah on November 24 and 25, he failed to find a buyer. After Shaw went unsold in the IPL 2025 mega auction, many former greats and experts of the game were shocked by this.
Former coach Jawala Singh, who has trained Shaw for over three years, during a recent interaction explained the defined shortcoming that caused Shaw not to get any buyers.
His performance hasn’t been consistent, according to him; that was a major factor.
“Prithvi came to me in 2015 and stayed with me for three years. When he came, he hadn’t played for Mumbai Under-16, and his father had asked me to guide him. Then in the next year, he played Under-19 Cooch Behar Trophy and scored very well in selection matches. And I worked very hard on him. He was talented from the beginning; I will not take full credit because many coaches have worked for him, but at that time it was only me. I am excited when he played in Under-19 World Cup because he is my first student to achieve it. He had celebrated his birthday with me just before leaving for the Under-19 World Cup, but after that, I have not seen him; that was 2017. Here we are in 2024; I have not seen him; he has not come to me,” he recounted.
Jwala has drawn a fine parallel between the former India captain of U-19 World Cup winning teams with his other student Yashasvi Jaiswal and explained why the latter is scaling such great heights at present in his career while Shaw is struggling.
“My personal opinion, it is the process that we call a work ethic because I feel if you are talented, talent is just a seed and to make it a tree; consistency is important in that journey, and that consistency comes from your lifestyle; your work ethic, and discipline is how I feel that consistency is not with him in it. One might have made a great start, which he did, but to be at the top in international cricket, one has always to improve his game. Even Sachin Tendulkar refined his game consistently and fine-tuned his game, apart from getting his fitness and mental toughness. So, I feel a player goes off track only if he gets away from the process. You will not fall back if your process and work ethic are fine, so I feel players fail because of that. As far as Yashasvi is concerned, his work ethic is superb; he really works hard, and he knows what to do. That is the main difference,” he added.
To speak about Jaiswal, he made his international debut for India in July last year during a Test match against West Indies and he has currently been into Australia with the Indian Test team. Scoring 161 in the second innings of the first Test between India and Australia at Optus Stadium in Perth, Jaiswal has now benefited from his super show with the bat as well as in the ICC rankings; also, the latest rankings released on Wednesday (November 27) have put him to the No. 2 position.
