West Indies all-rounder Carlos Brathwaite believes Indian selectors should not rush Vaibhav Suryavanshi into international cricket despite success in the Indian Premier League. Brathwaite said the BCCI should take a leaf out of West Indies cricket in how the latter managed a young Brian Lara in the nascent stages of his career.

Brathwaite recalled that Lara rubbed shoulders with the likes of Sir Vivian Richards in the domestic circuit before he made his debut for the Caribbean nation. 

The left-hander scored a magnum opus knock of 103 runs off just 37 balls with the help of five and a dozen sixes against SRH on Saturday. He scored his runs at a blistering strike rate of 278.38. Thus, he played a key role in helping RR post a par score of 228 runs on the board. 

This was the second IPL century for the youngster, and he became the fastest batter to 1000 T20 runs. But, his efforts went in vain as SRH registered a five-wicket win

Carlos Brathwaite said on ESPN Cricinfo, “I apologise, Vaibhav, but if you look at how West Indies handled Brian Lara… he was a generational talent, everyone knew. So, what did West Indies do? They put him in the mix with Viv Richards and what not, but he didn’t play [international cricket]. That was a different time with loads of tour games, and he cut his teeth with the senior players without having made his debut. And then we know how his career went once he debuted.

“So maybe there is the best of both worlds – where you can have him with the Indian team – learn from Virat Kohli, learn from Rohit Sharma, learn from Suryakumar Yadav. There are younger players that are close to him in age that he can learn from, before just throwing him in the deep end,” Brathwaite added.

Rajasthan Royals will next take on Punjab Kings at New Chandigarh on Tuesday.