Legendary Sunil Gavaskar has lavished praise on Sanju Samson after India secured a seven-wicket win against Afghanistan in the second T20I at the Arun Jaitley Stadium, Delhi on Tuesday. Samson got off to a sedate start in his innings, scoring eight runs off the first 10 balls.

However, he was able to change gears after getting his eye in, smashing 43 runs off the next 10 deliveries, thus reaching his fifty off only 20 balls. This was Samson’s fastest T20I fifty as he batted at the top of his game.

Gavaskar reckons this approach of first settling at the crease and then playing aggressively is best for Sanju Samson.

“It’s sometimes the consistency that you want and because the openers get most of the strike in a 20-over game, they have the most opportunities to score. Sometimes, like today, he played himself in and he started hammering the balls only later. If he keeps on doing that, I don’t think he’ll ever fail. He’ll keep on getting 50s and 60s every time,” Sunil Gavaskar told the broadcasters.

“It’s only when he looks to try and go bang-bang from the first ball, and then you have to do that if you’re chasing 190 or 200, then there is no option of doing that. But he’s a terrific player,” he added.

Samson eventually scored 57 runs off 22 balls with the help of seven fours and four sixes at a strike rate of 259.09.

Samson hasn’t received his chances consistently and this was a crucial knock for his confidence. The Kerala batter was recently dropped from the series against Zimbabwe and had played only two out of the five T20Is against England. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi had received his opportunity against Zimbabwe and also played three games against England.

The third and final T20I between Afghanistan and India will be played at Delhi on Thursday.