Baby Boss Vaibhav steals the show at Chepauk with fan frenzy

Fifteen-year-old Vaibhav Sooryavanshi received a superstar welcome at Chennai's Chepauk as nearly 12,000 fans gathered to watch him play in the Duleep Trophy final. The Bihar batter's IPL exploits have sparked comparisons with India's biggest cricket icons

Chennai: “Vaibhav bhai, Vaibhav ji, Vaibhav.”

The roar reached a crescendo as Sooryavanshi walked to the fence to greet fans, who had been waiting since Sunday morning to have a closer look at the latest cricketing darling.

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The Tamil Nadu Cricket Association opened the lower stands in the C, D and E blocks at the MA Chidambaram Stadium here free of cost for the Duleep Trophy final between South Zone and East Zone.

However, they would not have expected nearly 12,000 spectators to rush to fill those stands.

It’s a rare sight in domestic cricket these days, and one often confined to romantics’ memories from the 1980s or 1990s.

The last time such a frenzy was witnessed was on January 30, 2025, when Virat Kohli turned out for Delhi in a Ranji Trophy match after 12 years.

Before that, around 15,000 fans waited to get a glimpse of Sachin Tendulkar in his last first-class match for Mumbai against Haryana at Lahli in 2013.

Sooryavanshi is yet to reach the batting heights achieved by those two icons during their illustrious careers.

But an explosive IPL 2026 campaign has given the 15-year-old the kind of stardom that only a select few have enjoyed in Indian cricket.

For someone like England’s Jos Buttler, Sooryavanshi is destined to break all T20 records, while Krishnamachari Srikkanth believes the Bihar boy will infuse more life into Test cricket in the near future.

For his East Zone skipper Ishan Kishan, Sooryavanshi is “very smart for a 15-year-old boy” who already knows the ins and outs of his life and career.

But there is still a boyish impishness simmering under that collected exterior.

It oozed out when he hammered senior India pacer Mohammad Siraj for a six and two fours in an over.

Siraj and fellow quick MD Nideesh tested him with a few snorters early in the first session, but the left-hander ducked or weaved away from them.

The Hyderabad man soon changed his angle of attack — much fuller and dangerously close to Sooryavanshi’s hitting arc.

The batter exploited it to the hilt, scoring three boundaries and a maximum.

From 11 off 14 balls, Sooryavanshi soon moved to 34 off 24 balls.

The 93-minute show, which kept the cheering fans delirious, eventually ended when Sooryavanshi pulled CV Milind’s delivery to substitute fielder Tanay Thyagarajan in the deep.

However, the crowd did not disperse. They waited till the end of the day to chant his name incessantly, prompting Sooryavanshi to spend a few minutes with the eager fans.

So, how does Sooryavanshi take in all this adulation and the status of being the national crush?

“He is a down-to-earth person. He does not think much about all this and thinks only about his cricket. It’s nice to have him in the dressing room,” said Shikhar Mohan, his East Zone teammate, after the day’s play.

But that moment, which transpired under the fading Chennai sun, made one thing clear — the Vaibhav era has just begun.