Abhishek Sharma vs Suryakumar Yadav Stats: Test, ODI, T20I & IPL
By CricketTaken EditorialPublished Cricket in India8 min read
Abhishek Sharma strikes at 171.27 across his Indian Premier League career and Suryakumar Yadav at 148.54. That is a gap of nearly twenty-three runs per hundred balls between two India batters of overlapping generations, and it is the most interesting number on this page.
Suryakumar's answer is everything else. He averages 33.44 in the competition to Abhishek's 29.37, has 4,581 runs to Abhishek's 2,379, and has a Twenty20 international record — 3,220 runs at 36.59 with four hundreds — built over more than twice as many caps.
They are also different jobs. Abhishek opens and has done since 2022; Suryakumar bats three or four. An opener facing the fielding restrictions has a licence a No. 4 arriving in the ninth over does not, and roughly twenty runs per hundred balls is about what that licence is worth.
The formats each has played
| Format | Abhishek Sharma | Suryakumar Yadav |
|---|---|---|
| Tests | none | 1 match, 8 runs |
| ODIs | not established | 37 matches, 773 runs at 25.77 |
| T20Is | 50 matches, 1,554 runs at 33.80, 2 hundreds, HS 135 | 110 matches, 3,220 runs at 36.59, 4 hundreds, HS 117 |
| IPL | 89 innings, 2,379 runs at 29.37, 2 hundreds, HS 141 | 166 innings, 4,581 runs at 33.44, 2 hundreds, HS 103* |
Neither has a Test career worth the name. Suryakumar's one appearance produced eight runs and Abhishek has not been selected. Between them they represent a generation of Indian batters whose value is entirely in the shortest formats.
Twenty20 internationals
| Measure | Abhishek Sharma | Suryakumar Yadav |
|---|---|---|
| Matches | 50 | 110 |
| Runs | 1,554 | 3,220 |
| Average | 33.80 | 36.59 |
| Strike rate | above 190 | 162.63 |
| Hundreds | 2 | 4 |
| Fifties | 11 | 24 |
| Highest score | 135 | 117 |
Suryakumar has twice the caps, twice the runs and twice the hundreds. His average is 2.79 higher. On volume and consistency there is no argument.
The strike rate is where Abhishek has done something new. Striking above 190 across more than 1,500 Twenty20 international runs is a rate no established batter in the format's history has sustained over that volume, and it is roughly twenty-eight runs per hundred balls above Suryakumar's own 162.63, which was itself considered extreme when he set it.
Abhishek reached the top of the format's batting rankings in 2025 with a rating that stands as the highest any men's Twenty20 international batter has recorded. His 135 is the higher of the two men's best scores.
Where each innings starts
| Abhishek Sharma | Suryakumar Yadav | |
|---|---|---|
| Batting position | Opener | 3 or 4 |
| Overs typically faced from | 1st | 7th to 10th |
| Fielding restrictions available | Powerplay, every innings | Rarely |
| Bowling faced | New ball, seam | Spin through the middle |
| Dismissal risk profile | High, by design | Moderate |
This table explains most of the difference in the numbers above. An opener in Twenty20 cricket bats with two fielders outside the circle for six overs and is expected to use them. A batter arriving at three or four in the ninth over faces spin with the field spread and has to manufacture boundaries rather than hit into gaps that are already there.
Suryakumar's method — the ramp over the keeper, the pick-up over fine leg, the ability to hit the same length square on both sides — was developed precisely because the gaps are not there when he arrives. Abhishek's is more orthodox and more violent, built on hitting through the line while the field is up.
Neither is the harder job. They are different jobs, and a comparison that ranks the strike rates without saying so has not compared anything.
The Indian Premier League, season by season
| Season | Abhishek runs (SR) | Suryakumar runs (SR) |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 63 (190.9) | 512 (133.3) |
| 2019 | 9 (100.0) | 424 (130.9) |
| 2020 | 71 (126.8) | 480 (145.0) |
| 2021 | 98 (130.7) | 317 (143.4) |
| 2022 | 426 (133.1) | 303 (145.7) |
| 2023 | 226 (143.9) | 605 (181.1) |
| 2024 | 484 (204.2) | 345 (167.5) |
| 2025 | 439 (193.4) | 717 (167.9) |
| 2026 | 563 (204.7) | 270 (147.5) |
Abhishek's first four seasons produced 241 runs in total. From 2022, when Sunrisers Hyderabad moved him to open, he has scored 2,138 in five, and his last three seasons have come at strike rates of 204.2, 193.4 and 204.7.
Two IPL seasons at a strike rate above 204 is the outlying achievement in this comparison. No batter with a comparable number of innings has scored at that rate across a full campaign twice, and Abhishek has done it in 2024 and again in 2026.
Suryakumar's peak came slightly earlier and lasted longer. Nine consecutive seasons of 270 runs or more from 2018, four of them past 480, and a career-best 717 at an average of 65.2 in 2025.
| Career IPL | Abhishek | Suryakumar |
|---|---|---|
| Innings | 89 | 166 |
| Runs | 2,379 | 4,581 |
| Average | 29.37 | 33.44 |
| Strike rate | 171.27 | 148.54 |
| Hundreds | 2 | 2 |
| Fifties | 13 | 31 |
| Sixes | 144 | 178 |
| Fours | 224 | 482 |
The boundary split is the most revealing pair of columns. Abhishek has 144 sixes and 224 fours from 89 innings; Suryakumar 178 sixes and 482 fours from 166. Per innings Abhishek hits sixes at more than one and a half times Suryakumar's rate and fours at half of it.
That is a batter clearing the rope rather than finding gaps, which is what a strike rate of 171 looks like when it is broken down. The IPL's most sixes leaderboard puts both totals in context, and the most runs list Suryakumar's aggregate.
Six things the tables do not say
- Abhishek's 141 is the higher IPL score and his 135 the higher T20I score. Suryakumar has more hundreds in international cricket and the same number in the IPL.
- Suryakumar has 37 one-day caps and Abhishek has no established one-day record. Neither has a settled place in India's fifty-over side.
- Abhishek's four seasons before 2022 produced 241 IPL runs across twenty innings. Almost his entire record dates from the move to opening.
- Suryakumar has captained India in Twenty20 internationals; Abhishek has not.
- Abhishek's IPL strike rate exceeds Suryakumar's in four of the nine seasons both played, but by more than fifty in two of them. Before 2024 Suryakumar was the faster scorer in five seasons out of six.
- Suryakumar's 482 IPL fours to Abhishek's 224 is a larger proportional gap than anything in the six column, and it is the clearest evidence of two different methods rather than two levels of ability.
What the comparison settles
On weight of runs and international consistency Suryakumar Yadav has the larger career, and it is not close: twice the T20I caps, twice the runs, twice the hundreds, a higher average in both the IPL and Twenty20 internationals.
On the specific question of how fast a top-order batter can score without collapsing the average, Abhishek Sharma has moved the boundary of what was thought possible. A career IPL strike rate of 171 across 89 innings and two seasons above 204 are figures the competition had not seen before.
The comparison also has a timing problem worth naming: Suryakumar's career is largely made and Abhishek's is not. He was 25 when the figures above were compiled and had played 50 Twenty20 internationals to Suryakumar's 110.
Suryakumar Yadav against Hardik Pandya sets him against India's other Twenty20 mainstay, and the players index lists the full comparison set. Suryakumar Yadav's profile carries his biography and franchise record, the 2024 IPL season page covers the campaign in which Abhishek first struck above 200, and the cricket in India hub places both careers.
Sources and method
Suryakumar Yadav's figures across all formats come from his career record on this site as last revised, and his season-by-season IPL splits from the ball-by-ball archive of the competition through the 2026 final.
Abhishek Sharma's record required reconstruction and the method is worth stating. This site's player-page dataset merges his record with those of other cricketers sharing the name, producing an impossible career spanning seven franchises including two that folded before his debut. The figures used here are his Delhi Capitals season of 2018 and his Sunrisers Hyderabad seasons from 2019 onwards, which are the only rows that belong to him. Reconstructed that way his IPL career totals 89 innings, 2,379 runs at 29.37 and a strike rate of 171.27 — figures that match ESPNcricinfo's own IPL record for him exactly, which is the check that confirms the reconstruction is right.
His Twenty20 international figures — 50 matches, 1,554 runs at 33.80 with two hundreds and eleven fifties — are taken from published records as they stood on 2 July 2026. His Twenty20 international strike rate is given as "above 190" rather than a precise number because the sources consulted differ on the last decimal; all agree it exceeds 190.
That Abhishek reached the top of the men's Twenty20 international batting rankings in 2025 with the highest rating recorded in the format is drawn from published coverage of that ranking rather than from this site's data.
Comparisons of role — batting position, when each arrives, what bowling each faces — are descriptive. No adjustment has been made for opposition, venue or the era-wide rise in scoring rates, which has lifted every batter's numbers in the period covered. Both players were active when this page was written. All figures current as of 28 August 2026.