A file photo from December 23, 2019 shows Cumilla Warriors batsman Soumya Sarkar is clean bowled by Dhaka Platoon spinner Mahedi Hasan during their Bangabandhu Bangladesh Premier League match in Chattogram. — BCB photo
Despite being touted as one of the most explosive batsmen of Bangladesh, Soumya Sarkar has consistently failed to deliver in the shortest format, raising questions over his ability as a Twenty20 cricketer.
Soumya has been a regular name in the national team setup since the 2015 World Cup, being hailed as the future of Bangladesh cricket for his extravagant stroke-making but his shoddy numbers in the format make him look like a an overhyped ordinary player.
Soumya has played a total of 57 matches in the Bangladesh Premier League for six different franchises, but has managed to score only one fifty-plus innings, an unbeaten 58 against Chittagong Vikings for the Rangpur Riders which came way back in 2015 edition.
His stats present an extremely dire picture considering the batsman has batted in the top-three in 38 out of those 57 matches in the BPL.
The 26-year old has amassed 752 runs in his BPL career at an appalling average of 15.04, the lowest average for a batsman, who has scored at least 500 runs in BPL.
His rate of scoring has also been nowhere near par as he has a strike-rate of 104.44, the second lowest strike-rate in BPL for a player who has scored minimum 500 runs.
The left-hander, who was even named as an icon player for the 2016 BPL, has so far extended his sub-par BPL record in the running edition, by scoring 147 runs in six matches, with a highest score of 41.
Soumya failed to end his half-century drought in the recently concluded Chattogram phase, where a number of batsmen were taking full toll of the flat batting surface to score big runs.
Soumya’s performance in Twenty20 internationals also don’t give any better sign, with him having only one fifty in 46 outings, which came last year against Sri Lanka.
Soumya, who made his overall Twenty20 debut in 2012 BPL, has scored only one other fifty in domestic Twenty20 competitions, in the 2013 Dhaka Premier Twenty20 league and two more in practice matches, against a BCB XI in 2013 and against Ireland A in 2018.
Source: New Age.
