‘Always had the potential’: Anil Kumble breaks down Prabhsimran Singh’s IPL success

Former Punjab Kings coach and Indian legend Anil Kumble has praised opening batsman Prabhsimran Singh after his 83-run knock against Kolkata Knight Riders on Saturday. Kumble said Prabhsimran overcame his struggles against KKR and showed maturity at the crease.

Prabhsimran was picked up by Punjab Kings during the 2019 IPL season, when he was just 18 years old. Since then, he has survived several changes of management, impressing coaches from Hesson to Anil Kumble (2020-22), Trevor Bayliss (2023-24) and current head coach Ricky Ponting.

However, Prabhsimran didn't get many chances at the top of the order, with specialist openers such as Mayank Agarwal, KL Rahul and Chris Gayle in the side. Between 2019 and 2022, the Punjab-based batsman played just 6 IPL matches.

The right-handed batsman got a proper opportunity from IPL 2023 onwards, where he scored 358 runs and followed it up with 334 runs in the next season.

While most of the Punjab heavyweights were offloaded ahead of the IPL mega-auctions this year, the franchise showed faith in Prabhsimran, who was retained at a price of ₹4 crore along with Shashank Singh.

Prabhsimran's coming of age in IPL: 

While he had a couple of impressive seasons, Prabhsimran has looked the most in his element this season scoring 292 runs in just 9 matches with a strike rate of 168.78. Paired with the left handed Priyansh Arya, the opening pair of PBKS have been one of the best in the cash rich league this season. 

Speaking after the match, Kumble lauded Prabhsimran during an ESPNCrincfo show saying, "When Prabh gets bogged down, he looks to go after the bowling, step out and go down, but tonight he didn't do any of that,"

“You know, the other side was, was going hard. I mean, so, so, I guess it's, it shows that it's the maturity of a youngster coming through after being with Punjab for a while.” the former Indian cricketer added.

“I think he's always had the potential. I mean, you know when, when I was there, he was someone who you sort of thought I should play him every time you sort of thought that, because he was so good in the nets and also in practice games when, when you sort of played in those open nets” Kumble further noted.