After gaining the spotlight with an unbeaten 101 of 102 balls in the Under-19 World Cup Final against Australia, Manjot Kalra is keen to make the most of every opportunity that comes his way.
Hailing from the same academy that boasted of an earlier World Cup Final hero Unmukt Chand, who also scored a century against Australia in the 2012 Final, 19-year old Manjot is all set to feature in his first Indian Premier league season this year.
Procured by Delhi Daredevils for 20 lakhs, Kalra is excited to be a part of the tournament and is looking at it as an opportunity to learn a lot about the game when playing with and against top notch guns from all around the world.
"I'm excited to feature in my first IPl season and looking forward to it as an opportunity to learn from the best in the game. We've been a very strong side and I'm hopeful of leaving a mark with my performance," said Manjot.
However, Delhi already have a bunch of young talented players like Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer, who have made their national team debuts along with Kalra's World Cup teammates Prithvi Shaw and Abhishek Sharma, who will be giving tough competition to the Final's star man to make it into the playing XI.
Manjot, who used to opening the innings, will face even tougher competition for the top spot from big names like Gautam Gambhir, Jason Roy, Colin Munro and Glenn Maxwell, all of whom have been added to Delhi's squad ahead of this year's IPl to strengthen the team's core batting.
But the youngster doesn't seem to be affected by the competition and feels it's good for the side to have so many players who can win matches for them and remains hopeful to get featured in substantial number of games that will provide him his chances to make a mark.
The 19-year-old Delhi batsman, who first came to reckoning after scoring 172 against Punjab in the Cooch Bihar Trophy that paved the ways for his selection in the U-19 side, is also aiming to do better and perform consistently well in the domestic season to build inroads for his selection in the national side.
"My next target is to perform consistently well in the domestic circuit and in whatsoever matches I get to play I'll keep scoring a lot of runs with the bat," he said.