Online Reporter
BRIAN Bennett is in elite company.
The fight-handed batter has scored more runs in T20 international cricket than any other player in the world since January 1 last year.
The 21-year-old was one of the standout players at the T20 World Cup where he was featuring for the first time.
Bennett has scored 1,228 runs since January 1, last year, in T20 International matches.
Now, he finds himself in an elite group, which also includes Travis Head of Australia and Daryl Mitchell of New Zealand.
Head, who exploded as a makeshift opener for Australia during their comprehensive victory over England in the Ashes last year, has the highest runs in Test cricket since January 1 last year.
He has scored 1,009 runs.
Mitchell is the highest run scorer in ODIs, since January 1 last year, and has scored 1,113 runs.
Bennett is being touted as one of the next big things in world cricket and was the only batter who appeared comfortable taking on Indian superstar Jasprit Bumrah during the T20 World Cup.
He said he was over the moon for helping the Chevrons make history by qualifying for the Super Eight for the first time.
“It’s been pretty amazing. I’m obviously super excited that we got to the Super Eight. We are the first Zimbabwean team to get the Super Eight in the T20 World Cup which was really special,” he told Cricinfo.
“I am just grateful for the opportunity for us to come here and play, especially in India as well. Overall, just very happy that we’ve been able to do what we’ve been able to do.
“I surprised myself as well. The main goal for me is to just hang in there, get a good start to the powerplay and carry on knocking it around during the middle phases to give us more wickets at the back end to sort of fire on and go to higher strike rates.
There’s one game tomorrow, so we’ll see how that goes. But I’m very proud of not.”
He came close to getting a T20 World Cup century.
“I’m still young. There might be another couple of times where I can get the 100. So, I wasn’t too frustrated about that.
“I was more worried about giving guys, sort of the back-end guys, that chance to sort of experience what it’s like. Because there’s going to be times, special situations where we need to go and sort of go hard at the back end.”
It was a good tournament for the youthful players as 19-year-old Yuvraj Samra became the youngest player to score a T20 World Cup century.
Sri Lanka’s Pathum Nissanka’s unbeaten 100 against Australia in the group stage was the first hundred of the 2026 T20 World Cup.
Pakistan’s Sahibzada Farhan scored the most runs at T20 World Cup 2026, amassing 383 runs from seven matches to eclipse Virat Kohli’s single-edition record of 319 set in 2014. — Sports Reporter/Cricinfo
