‘I never thought I would get crores!’ Shubham Dubey, son of an unemployed father, says life will turn after windfall at the IPL auction | Cricket News

Shubham Dubey is still finding it tough to believe that he has become an overnight crorepati. Like most of the uncapped cricketers he too had filled his form hoping that he will find a place in an IPL team but says he never thought that his life would dramatically turn so suddenly. The 29-year old left-handed batsman from Nagpur was bought Rajasthan Royals for 5.80 crores in the IPL auction held in Dubai on Tuesday.
“In T20 Syed Mushtaq Ali, I did well so I was hoping that I would be picked but itna bada amount aayega (this much money)…! I never thought that I would get crores. Now my responsibility has increased,” Dubey said.
The phone hasn’t stopped ringing and local politicians and community leaders have landed at his home to congratulate “Dubeyji ka ladka”.
Just two seasons ago, he had got into the Vidarbha state team. This season at the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, Shivam had blasted a 20-ball 58 to help Vidarbha chase down a high target against Bengal. In seven innings this season he has slammed 221 runs at a strike rate of 190.

The financial windfall couldn’t have come at a better time for the Dubeys. Shivam’s father has been unemployed for a few years now, and his brother works in a private firm to support the family. With this IPL money, Shivam says life will certainly change for good.
“My father is without a job for a while now, and we went through really bad times. My father did some work here and there. I used to play for Advocate XI Club here and there used to be a coach named Sujit Jaiswal, who passed away during Covid. I didn’t even have money to even buy new gloves, it was him who gave me everything and made me play for his club. Today everything came in a flashback when I saw RR buying me,” he recalled.

The former Vidarbha coach Pritam Gandhe says Shivam has the ability to change the course of the game, with his powerful hitting prowess lower down the order.
“He is a talented cricketer, if anything lands in his radar, he has the capacity to slam the ball outside the ground. The power makes him the X-factor and he is the game changer of the team. He can handle the pressure and he can challenge anyone on his day. He is the perfect finisher of our team,” Gandhe said.

RR later posted a video, where their Director of High Performance, Zubin Bharucha spoke about their new team mate. “He has been unbelievable in his sort of journey. His journey has been almost as tough and tedious as Jaiswal’s (Yashasvi) journey. He couldn’t afford to buy his own bat this year. Just think that is an example of what these players go through some of them where they need to get to. But he has been able to push his game one step after another step slow and steadily, upto domestic level,” Bharucha said.