Cast your mind back to 2018. A teenager walks out to bat in his first Test match and smashes a century before lunch on day one. The cricket world collectively loses its mind. A superstar is born. India has found its next great opener.

Fast forward to IPL 2025. That same player — Prithvi Shaw — sits through an entire auction. No franchise wants him. He goes home unsold.

That is one of Indian cricket's most brutal falls from grace. And now, in IPL 2026, he's back — bought by Delhi Capitals for a humbling ₹75 lakh base price — and even his biggest supporter is having to publicly beg DC to actually play him. Let that sink in.

"They have the option of Abhishek Porel, who has performed really well whenever he has gotten chances. But I think they should go with Prithvi Shaw and give him clarity about his role."

Irfan Pathan, Former India International

Here's Where It Gets MESSY

Irfan Pathan went on his YouTube channel ahead of DC's opener and picked his preferred Delhi XI. He backed Shaw to open alongside KL Rahul. Lovely. But buried inside that endorsement was a sentence that said everything: "Give him clarity about his role."

A senior cricketer has to go on YouTube to ask Delhi Capitals to tell their own player what his job is. That is not a flex. That is a cry for help. Especially for a man with 1,892 IPL runs for this very franchise.

WAIT TILL YOU HEAR Pathan's Warning

"The hungry players who have gotten dropped are very excited, but they also put a lot of pressure on themselves to perform. This pressure always leads you towards failure." Don't do it again, Prithvi.

The Plot Thickens

Shaw hasn't been sitting idle. After going unsold, he switched to Maharashtra and absolutely ran riot. 537 runs in 7 Ranji matches. Average of 48.82. Strike rate over 91. In T20s, he made 183 runs at a strike rate over 160. That's a man who responded with a bat, not excuses.

Test century on debut at 18 Went UNSOLD in 2025 537 Ranji runs in 7 matches Bought back for ₹75 lakh

What Happens Next?

Delhi opens against LSG on April 1. We don't know if Shaw is in the XI. We don't know if they've listened to Pathan. What we do know is: a player who scored a Test hundred on debut is currently waiting to find out if he's playing.

If Prithvi Shaw gets his chance and reminds everyone what he looked like at 18, will Indian cricket finally acknowledge what it lost? Watch this space.