New Zealand have studied India’s teenage opener Vaibhav Sooryavanshi closely and expect home conditions to test the 15-year-old before the Twenty20 series begins on Thursday, paceman Jacob Duffy said. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Duffy said the hosts had spent time scouting the left-hander ahead of the five-match series, which opens at Hagley Oval in Christchurch.
Duffy praised Sooryavanshi’s power-hitting, which has drawn attention across world cricket. He said the teenager struck the ball very hard but did so consistently, adding that he was scoring at a rate of about 250 in every game and rarely getting out. Sooryavanshi has already broken several records in the Indian Premier League and became India’s youngest men’s international when he debuted in England in July.
Duffy says New Zealand have a plan for the teen
Duffy said Sooryavanshi had played in England, so conditions in New Zealand would be different for him, and that this would be one of the challenges he faced. “We’ve certainly had a good scouting session on him and got our plans as to what we want to do to him,” Duffy said.
The series is also notable for the teenager’s recent form. After a slow start against England, he became the youngest player to score a half-century in men’s international cricket, reaching fifty from 18 balls against Zimbabwe. He later won an Asian Games gold medal in Japan, where India also won the T20 cricket title in Aichi-Nagoya.
Seam-friendly pitches could shape the Hagley Oval contest
India supporters are expected to watch closely to see how Sooryavanshi copes with New Zealand’s pitches, which tend to favour seam bowling. Duffy said he had spoken to the head groundsman at Hagley Oval about what to expect from the wicket. He said he hoped the surface would not become a batter’s paradise, as some subcontinent pitches can be.
Duffy joked that the groundsman, who is from Invercargill, had promised him some bounce. He was born in Lumsden, a small town near the South Island city. Asked about the pitch, he added with a laugh that, as long as it was not Hyderabad, he would be happy.
Duffy returns with a big year behind him
The T20 series is the first part of India’s tour, with one-day matches and a two-test series to follow. Duffy, an Otago bowler, has had a busy year. He claimed the Sir Richard Hadlee Medal as New Zealand’s top player in 2025, reached the final of this year’s T20 World Cup in India and won the IPL with Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
Duffy made his Test debut last year at the age of 31. He missed the mid-year tour of England and the one-off Test against Ireland so he could be at home for the birth of his first child. Missing those matches has left him keen to face India with the red ball, ahead of a four-Test tour of Australia. “I’ve played four tests in my life. I get up for any test. There’s something special about them,” he said.
