13-year-old Yash Chawde breaks national record with an unbeaten 508 in junior cricket tournament

During the Mumbai Indians’ Junior Inter-School (Under-14) cricket tournament, 13-year-old Yash Chawde, playing for Saraswati Vidyalaya, made headlines with his unbeaten 508 against Siddheshwar Vidyalaya at the Jhulelal Institute of Technology ground in Nagpur. With this massive score to his name, Yash became the highest individual-scorer in the limited-overs format in inter-school cricket tournaments across India. During his record-breaking outing, the right-handed Yash slammed 81 fours and 18 sixes in his 178-ball innings on Friday. Batting alongside Tilak Wakode, who scored 127 off 97 balls, the pair stitched 714 for the first wicket in 40 overs, which is a record in itself.

As per the noted statistician, Mohandas Menon, the 13-year-old Yash Chawde is only the second batter after Sri Lanka’s Chirath Selleperuma to register 500 plus runs in limited-overs cricket. In August 2022, Selleperuma scored 553 in an Under-15 inter-school tournament Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka, Mohandas told Times of India (TOI).

“According to my records, Chawde is only the 10th batter to make a score of 500+ across all formats and age groups. Out of 10, five batters in the list are Indians. They are Pranav Dhanawade (1009*), Priyanshu Moliya (556*), Prithvi Shaw (546), Dady Havewala (515) and Yash Chawde (508*),” said Menon.

Meanwhile, cricket was never Yash’s first love. While growing up or up until three years back, he was doing exceptionally well in skating in state and national tournaments across the country. Worried about his future in skating, Yash’s father, Shravan, who is a mid-day meal contractor, decided to put Yash into cricket when he was 11 – only to see his son prosper one day and make his father proud.

As per Ravi Kulkarni, who is the supervisor of Saraswati Vidyalaya, Yash has the talent to achieve great heights in cricket and replicate Faiz Faizal’s record in First-Class cricket – who also scored 280 plus playing for Saraswati Vidyalaya in VCA Under-14 inter-school tournament against Rajendra High School in the past.

“Faiz went on to play for India and is one of the leading batters in First Class cricket. Yash has it in him to replicate what Faiz has achieved,” said Ravi Kulkarni.

Kulkarni adds Yash is a disciplined kid and has a good cricketing sense. He adds when Yash takes his stance, his body language on the field makes him stand out among others. He also calls him a ‘lambey race ka ghoda’.

“He is disciplined and has good cricketing acumen. When he stands on the field, his body language makes him stand out. When he bats, it looks like he is ‘lambey race ka ghoda’,” said Kulkarni.

This season for Saraswati Vidyalaya in the Under-16 VCA tournament, Yash has looked in supreme touch, having amassed 1000 plus runs including two hundreds.