Manoj Tiwary hopes to grow as a player while playing for the Rising Pune Supergiants

What’s the story?

On Monday, during the Indian Premier League auction in Bengaluru, a lot of big names fetched huge sums, some among whom also found new teams for the upcoming season of the League.

From the Indian contingent, a name which would bring back memories, particularly for those avidly followed and covered cricket about a decade ago is Manoj Tiwary.

The Bengal batsman, touted as the next prodigious talent to emerge out of the Indian cricket circuit at the time, was among the premier young batsman along with the likes of Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and the rest and was thought to be one of the key members of the middle order in the coming years.

However, in a country like India where the ambition to play for the country is as high as it gets, it really involves more than just hard work and sweat to make it big and like has been the case with so many players, Tiwary’s career just could not get the kickstart it required and at the age 31, he now finds himself out of the reckoning.

Extra Cover: RPS team 2017: Full list of players bought by Rising Pune Supergiants

But on Monday, Tiwary got a new lease of life in his cricketing career, when he was picked by the Rising Pune Supergiants in the auction for a sum of Rs. 50 Lakhs. Expectedly delighted over his selection, the right-hander was thankful for the opportunity and hoped to learn from the likes of MS Dhoni, Faf du Plessis, Steve Smith etc.

"I want to thank the RPS team management for showing faith in me. It feels nice to be back in the IPL after missing out on action last season.I have always loved playing the game. Money comes later. IPL is a big platform and I was more interested to get an opportunity to perform on that stage. I am happy to have got that chance.

“I hope to grow as a player by learning from them” he told the Times of India.

In case you didn’t know...

In the recently concluded Syed Mushtaq Ali competition, Tiwary was one of the key contributors to East Zone’s eventual triumph, making 108 runs at a strike-rate of 161 to finish as the third highest run-getter for his zone after Ishank Jaggi and Virat Singh.

Tiwary has good numbers as far as his overall IPL career is concerned, having made 1324 runs in 78 games at a strike-rate of 113 and in the 2012 final against the Chennai Super Kings, hit the winning run to help the Kolkata Knight Riders win their maiden title in front of a packed Chidambaram Stadium crowd in Chennai.

What’s next?

For Tiwary, the upcoming season of the IPL will be absolutely vital. The Indian team at present is choc-a-bloc with a replacement waiting in the wings for each of the specialist players and perhaps, the only team where Tiwary could find a possible place in is the Indian T20 side, if at all the replacements are also not in a position to fill the gap.

In order to stake a claim for that, Tiwary will need to be high on the list for the most number of runs made by a batsman in the League and if he can get there, then surely he would have boosted the RPS’s chances of going all the way.

Sportskeeda’s take

The selection of Manoj Tiwary in the Rising Pune Supergiants will give the side a lot more depth to the side, who finished 7^th in the table last year. The team could utilise Tiwary in the lower middle-order if MS Dhoni decides to come up the batting order for the team.

Ben Stokes would come in after Dhoni and Tiwary could be the player in the Number 6 or 7 position, who could lend the depth the team will reuire in their batting.