Ambati Rayudu believes Dhruv Jurel deserves more attention, while Aaron Finch praised the Rajasthan Royals batter for having “the complete game” after an eye-catching knock helped RR seal a win over Royal Challengers Bengaluru in their IPL 2026 fixture on Friday night. Jurel, who is still relatively new to international cricket with nine Tests and four T20Is to his name, has often felt like a support option—behind Rishabh Pant in Tests and among the various choices in the shorter format. But in the latest innings, he made a strong case that he is ready for bigger stages.
The knock took Jurel’s tally to 176 runs across four outings, with his batting coming from No. 3—his role this season. When he walked in, Yashasvi Jaiswal had already departed and RR were reeling at 21 for 1 after two overs in a chase of 202. Jurel held his nerve all the way to the end, outlasting the pressure of a high target and an early wobble. At the start of the campaign, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi had drawn most of the spotlight, and that attention has only intensified lately—yet Jurel quickly emerged as the steadying presence RR needed in the middle.
Rayudu, speaking on ESPNcricinfo’s TimeOut show, highlighted both Jurel’s craft and his mindset. “He has shown a lot of class in terms of skill as well as his temperament. He really stood out,” Rayudu said. He added that Jurel looks increasingly mature as a batter and suggested the next step is to raise his impact across all formats for India. “He looks to be a very, very mature batsman now. It’s time that he steps up in terms of all the formats of the game, hopefully for India,” Rayudu remarked. Rayudu also argued that Jurel is flying under the radar despite his talent. “The world needs to talk about him a little more than what they generally do. He’s flying under the radar right now. In Indian cricket, I don’t see many people being more talented than him in terms of being a complete batsman. So he’s an amazing talent and I don’t think he should be [overlooked]. He should be given his due.”
Finch, after watching the innings firsthand, echoed the “complete game” assessment. “His technique, his temperament, his ability to sum up the situation, pace and spin—he’s got the complete game,” Finch said about Jurel. He also pointed to how effortlessly Jurel looked at the crease, stressing that the knock never felt like a batter settling in slowly. “How easy he made batting look when he first walked to the crease was something else. And it’s easy to just fall into the trap of saying, you know what, ‘youngster, you just keep going, I’ll get one [and give you the strike]’. He came out and just hit the ball in the middle of the bat from ball one. He was brilliant.” Finch further noted that Jurel’s composure allowed the momentum to continue, making it simpler for Sooryavanshi to keep pushing forward. “And was a big reason why Vaibhav was able to continue to go, because he had the partner who maintained the momentum and then he was able to just keep pushing the button,” Finch added.
Jurel himself, however, played down the hype. Batting alongside Sooryavanshi—currently the Orange Cap holder and one of the defining storylines of this IPL season—cannot be easy, yet Jurel described how the partnership can ease the pressure. “When I bat at No. 3, he makes my batting look easy,” Jurel said at the press conference after the match. “When you go in and Vaibhav is smashing every ball, you tend to think nothing is happening on the wicket.” He then contrasted the calm on the surface with the reality of the challenge underneath. “And inside, like, cricket is not easy [like Sooryavanshi makes it seem].” Jurel recalled the situation after the powerplay began to shape up. “And [after] five overs, we were like 65-70 [73] runs. And that sixth over, Abhinandan [Singh] bowled to me, and I was just telling myself, ‘I have to cash in, I have to cash in, I have to cash in’.”
He cashed in immediately, striking a sequence of 4, 6, 4, 0, 6 and 4 to turn the momentum into a decisive surge. That 24-run over helped RR end the powerplay on 97 for 1, setting the chase up for a successful finish.
Jurel explained that when a partner is batting with confidence, it creates a platform—but it also brings its own pressure. “When you go in, he’s hitting the ball so well. And then there is pressure too. That he is playing so well, I have to do something too. Again, it’s also easy because you feel that if he is playing so well, so can I,” he said. He added that the key is finding the ball early and letting timing take over. “All you need is the first boundary. To feel the ball in the middle of the bat. And then it flows.”
With the new batting position appearing to suit him, Jurel’s role also reflects RR’s current top-order shape—slotting into the order ahead of Shimron Hetmyer and captain Riyan Parag, and following the high-energy Sooryavanshi-Yashasvi Jaiswal partnership.
Asked about the importance of where he bats, Jurel’s message was simple: winning comes first, regardless of the spot. “At the end of the day, you just need to win the match. Irrespective of what number you are batting at,” he said. He noted that last year he was often asked to bat at six or five, while this season he’s working at No. 3. “Management has shown some faith in me. So for me, batting number is just a number. My character is such that even if you ask me to bat at eight or nine, I will take it happily. I know that I have to hit the winning six or four. I have always been like that.”
Jurel also described the match context when his highest T20 score was on the line. “It was my highest score [in T20s]. When Vaibhav got out… he made the match very easy. Six-and-a-half or seven [6.34] runs were required [per over] when he got out. So my job was to just get it done.” He added that he and his partners—Riyan and Ravindra Jadeja—talked through the finishing plan. “I was speaking to Riyan and [Ravindra] Jadeja that run hard, just two, three, and one odd ball will come and we’ll get a boundary, so we’re good to go. Just try and finish it in 18-19 overs, and that’s exactly what we did.”
With this victory, RR reached a perfect start of four wins in four games. They will now travel for their next three matches, with a brief period away from their base in Guwahati—their second home—before returning to Jaipur, their proper home ground. With Sooryavanshi, Jaiswal and Jurel producing the kind of batting that changes games, RR will be looking to keep that momentum going as the season moves forward.
