‘He will be bigger than the Messis of this world’: Lalit Modi on Sooryavanshi

4 min readUpdated: Jun 4, 2026 08:32 PM IST

Vaibhav Sooryavanshi of Rajasthan Royals plays a shot during Eliminator of the TATA Indian Premier League 2026 between Sunrisers Hyderabad and Rajasthan Royals at New International Cricket Stadium, New Chandigarh, India, on May 27, 2026.

Former Indian Premier League (IPL) commissioner heaped praise on teenage sensation Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, saying that the 15-year-old will be bigger than even Argentina’s Lionel Messi as well as Hollywood and Bollywood stars.

“What a delight he is. He will be bigger than anybody on the planet. He will be bigger than any Hollywood or Bollywood star. He will be bigger than the Messis of this world… I say this with conviction when I see his style of batting and the fearlessness in that boy. At that age to have that confidence, it’s a magic…,” he said in an interview with ANI.

Sooryavanshi won the Orange Cap in the 2026 edition of the Indian Premier League with 776 runs in 16 matches. Next up, he’ll be playing for India A in a tri-series in Sri Lanka, set to start next week. There are also chances that the prodigy will be fast-tracked to the India senior T20 side for the upcoming series vs Ireland and England.

#WATCH | On Indian cricketer Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, IPL founder and first chairman Lalit Modi says, “… What a delight he is. He will be bigger than anybody on the planet. He will be bigger than any Hollywood or Bollywood star. He will be bigger than the Messis of this world… I… pic.twitter.com/RhbcKyiUFw

— ANI (@ANI) June 4, 2026

“Bilateral Test Cricket will die”

Modi also issued a stark ultimatum regarding the survival of cricket’s longest format. He warned that traditional, bilateral red-ball series are on an absolute path to extinction unless radical commercial interventions are introduced to recapture global audiences.

“I am saying that Test matches on bilateral will die,” Lalit Modi stated bluntly. “The next prediction of mine is that now they should allow IPL-type (T20-type) Test matches. The next thing that they should be doing is for Test matches to come in.” Lalit Modi’s blueprint for the future of international cricket requires a ruthless pruning of the calendar, specifically identifying One-Day Internationals (ODIs) as obsolete dead weight.

“One-Day (ODI) should die. The test should survive. Test is a very important part,” he insisted. Lalit Modi acknowledged that red-ball cricket cannot compete financially with short-form leagues, but argued that sustainability lies in franchise corporate backing rather than government boards.

“Unfortunately, (Test cricket) will die if it’s not taken over by club cricket because of no viewership on a global level. So it will be a loss leader. I’m not saying everything has to make money… You don’t have to have profit in everything. You’ve got to do something for the game too.”

To bridge the generational gap, Lalit Modi reiterated his highly debated proposal, previously floated on The Overlap Podcast alongside former England captain Michael Vaughan, to merge IPL fan loyalty with the red-ball game.

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“Let the IPL teams own Test cricket teams,” Lalit Modi explained. “You got the youngsters, you got the loyalty factors… At least play one [exhibition] in a season between each other just to get their youngsters back into the game. That’s going to be like club cricket. You have club cricket in everything, but the primary has to be country versus country.” For the World Championship format, he proposed a strict, premier country-vs-country format played globally every year to preserve national pride and elite athletic standards. For IPL owners, he proposed field-independent Test squads for limited windows to engage younger, digital-first audiences by leveraging T20 club loyalties.

Lalit Modi also proposed shifting five-day Tests to four-day, day-night matches to counter declining stadium attendance and align with modern media consumption habits.

(With ANI inputs)

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