Sanju Samson Becomes 3rd Indian Wicketkeeper After MS Dhoni And Rishabh Pant To...

Sanju Samson is playing for India in the fifth T20I against South Africa. In the match taking place at Ahmedabad’s Narendra Modi Stadium, Samson opened his account on the third ball after South Africa skipper

Aiden Markram invited India to bat first, and then on the last ball of the second over bowled by Marco Jansen, he smashed his first six of the match. The six by Samson on the fourth ball of his innings helped him complete 1000 runs in T20Is for the Indian team.

Samson needed five runs on Friday to join the 1000-run club for the two-time T20 World Cup winners.

Sanju is the third Indian specialist wicketkeeper-batter after MS Dhoni and Rishabh Pant to score at least 1000 runs in T20Is. However, unlike Dhoni, Samson has not scored all of his 1000 T20I runs as a designated wicketkeeper-batter.

Most runs for India as wicketkeeper in T20Is

PLAYER	MATCHES	RUNS (As WK)	RUNS (Overall)
MS Dhoni	98	1617	1617
Rishabh Pant	64	996	1209
Sanju Samson	35	706	1003*
Ishan Kishan	16	369	796
KL Rahul	8	305	2265
Dinesh Karthik	19	166	686
Jitesh Sharma	16	162	162
Robin Uthappa	2	81	249
Parthiv Patel	1	26	36
Naman Ojha	2	12	12
Dhruv Jurel	2	6	12

Samson is overall the 14th Indian to score at least 1000 runs in T20Is.

Most runs in T20Is for India

PLAYER	MATCHES	INNINGS	RUNS	BEST SCORE
Rohit Sharma	159	151	4231	121*
Virat Kohli	125	117	4188	122*
Suryakumar Yadav	99*	92	2783*	117
KL Rahul	72	68	2265	110*
Hardik Pandya	124*	96	1939*	71*
Shikhar Dhawan	68	66	1759	92
MS Dhoni	98	85	1617	56
Suresh Raina	78	66	1605	101
Rishabh Pant	76	66	1209	65*
Yuvraj Singh	58	51	1177	77*
Tilak Varma	40*	36	1110*	120*
Shreyas Iyer	51	47	1104	74*
Abhishek Sharma	33*	32	1100*	135
Sanju Samson	52*	44	1003*	111
Gautam Gambhir	37	36	932	75

Apart from completing 1000 runs in T20Is for the Indian team on Friday, Samson also completed 8000 runs in T20 cricket. He is the seventh Indian after Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, Suryakumar Yadav, Suresh Raina and KL Rahul to amass a total of at least 8000 runs in the 20-over format of the game.

Most runs in T20s by Indian batters

PLAYER	MATCHES	RUNS	BEST SCORE
Virat Kohli	414	13,543	122*
Rohit Sharma	463	12,248	121*
Shikhar Dhawan	334	9797	106*
Suryakumar Yadav	346*	8970	117
Suresh Raina	336	8654	126*
KL Rahul	239	8125	132*
Sanju Samson	320*	8004*	119
Ajinkya Rahane	294	7633	105*

In the ongoing match, if India captain Suryakumar manages to score at least 30 runs, then he will also complete 9000 runs in T20s. As of now, Surya has 8970 runs to his credit in 345 matches played so far.