The 22-year-old, who comes from Kota, started his cricketing journey at the age of 8
Rajasthan Royals (RR) have handed a debut to local lad Kunal Singh Rathore in Match 53 of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at Eden Gardens on May 4 (Sunday).
Kunal debuted for Rajasthan in 2022, and has since featured in 15 first-class, 16 List A and 12 T20 encounters for his state.
The wicketkeeper-batter made his T20 debut in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT) in 2022-23, scoring 147 runs in seven innings at an average of 36.75 and a strike rate of 128.9.
Then in the next edition of the SMAT, the 22-year-old got 107 runs at an average of 35.67, but his strike rate went up to 152.9. The left-hander mostly bats in the middle-order, and has done well for his state in the other two formats as well.
Kunal, who was bought for INR 30 lakhs at the mega auction for IPL 2025, also featured in the DY Patil T20 Cup earlier this year. The youngster smashed 109 runs in three innings at an average of 54.5 and a stunning strike rate of 209.6.
Kunal, who comes from Kota, started his cricketing journey at the age of 8 and also attended the Rajasthan Royals Academy camp in Nagpur as an Under-17 player.
According to the RR website, Kunal trained under Zubin Bharucha, the Director of High Performance at the Royals. He was also picked by RR in the IPL 2023 auction but didn’t get to play a single game.
Kunal is a big fan of Australian wicketkeeper-batter Brad Haddin.
RR have already been knocked out of the IPL 2025, while KKR need to win all of their remaining four games to keep themselves alive in the competition.
