TNPL was a new experience as the crowd was different, says Vineeth

V.K. Vineeth didn’t feature in Tamil Nadu’s under-14 or under-16 teams.

But he made the Vinoo Mankad and Cooch Behar Trophy squads and, last season, emerged as the Vinoo Mankad Trophy’s top run-scorer with 488 runs.

Then came the High Performance Camp at CoE, followed by a tour of Sri Lanka with India u-19, where he scored a hundred in a youth ODI.

Vineeth is part of India u-19’s series against Australia. On Monday, he scored a gritty 87 as India sealed the series.

His story began in Chennai, where he started playing cricket at seven. His father, a Southern Railway RPF employee, introduced him to the game. His elder brother, K. Veeraviswa, who played Tamil Nadu u-19, became another influence.