PRETORIA, Aug 12 (PTI): India�s new batting sensation Shikhar Dhawan today gave yet another exhibition of stunning strokeplay by smashing a blistering 248 off 150 balls against South Africa A here, missing out on a world record feat by just 20 runs.
27-year-old Dhawan, who clobbered 30 boundaries and seven sixes in his superlative knock, became the second highest individual scorer in the history of List A games (limited overs matches) behind former England and Surrey batsman Alistair Brown. Brown had scored 268 for Surrey against Glamorgan at Oval back on July 19, 2002.
If Dhawan�s first 100 came off only 86 balls, the second hundred came off only 46 balls as he raced to his first List A double hundred in only 132 balls with a push off left-arm seamer Beuran Hendricks� bowling at the LC de Villiers Oval.
During his rampaging knock, the stylish left-hander surpassed two of his illustrious senior teammates Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, who had scored double centuries in one-day internationals which also qualify as List A games.
On personal best of 220, Dhawan created a national record by surpassing Sehwag�s best of 219 in an one-dayer against West Indies at Indore back in 2011.
Just when it looked that he would eclipse the world record, he was caught by wicketkeeper Dane Vilas of Rusty Theron�s bowling trying another slog shot. Dhawan added 285 runs in only 33.5 overs with his skipper Cheteshwar Pujara, who also scored a century.
Such was his domination that out of his 162 out of his 248 runs came in only 37 scoring strokes.
Dhawan made a memorable Test debut against Australia earlier this year with a brilliant 187 and has not looked back since then as he became the best batsman in India�s victorious Champions Trophy campaign recently.
Dhawan started smashing bowlers from the word �go� as the first ball of the match bowled by seamer Hardus Viljoen was driven towards long-on for a boundary.
In Viljoen�s second and the third over of the innings, Dhawan hit the bowler for three consecutive boundaries, something he repeated when left-arm spinner Rolief van der Merwe also came into bowl.
The moment a bowler pitched short, Dhawan rocked back to pull the deliveries in the region between deep mid-wicket and deep square leg. If he got fuller deliveries, he launched into it to ferociously drive it in the arc between cover and mid-off. If there was width outside the off-stump, then the square cut came into play.
He reached his 100 off 86 balls with a four of Van der Merwe�s bowling. As if to celebrate his milestone, he lofted pacer Theron over cover for successive sixes.
