A lot has been written and said about Suryakumar Yadav and Hardik Pandya ever since the former beat the latter in the race for India's T20I captaincy. Hardik was a clear reader even till the T20 World Cup last month. He was India's vice-captain there and till Rohit Sharma hadn't decided on a late T20I comeback earlier this year, he was the price regent of the Indian side.

Things, however, changed quickly after Pandya's ankle injury during the ODI World Cup last year. Pandya was out of action for about five months. It was enough for the selectors and the team management to look for alternatives and none better than India's No.1 T20I batter, Suryakumar Yadav.

Interesingly, the Sri Lanka T20Is which India won 3-0, was the first instance of Surya leading a side featuring Hardik, Previously, it was always the other away around in the Indian side as well as in the IPL for Mumbai Indians.

Naturally, there was much speculation about Surya and Hardik's camaraderie. The three T20Is in Pallekele erased any doubts.

After India beat Sri Lanka in the third T20I via Super Over, coach Gautam Gambhir gave his first on-camera speech inside the dressing room. After his address, Hardik provided the finishing touches.

Hardik praised Suryakumar for his inspired bowling changes, with the India skipper bringing on Rinku Singh (1-0-3-2) for the penultimate over and himself for the last over (1-0-5-2) which turned the game on its head.

"As Gauti bhai mentioned, Surya, well done in making sure that the way you rotate the bowlers, showing faith in the bowlers which you gave (the ball to) in the last couple of overs that was brilliant and as a bowling group, obviously, it was fantastic," he said in a video posted by BCCI.

When Hardik said all this, the camera focused on Surya, who had an awkward smile on his face. Praise of this level from a teammate is not something Surya is habituated to, especially when the cameras are rolling.

Hardik lauds Gill, Parag and Washington

Hardik also praised Shubman Gill and Riyan Parag for their gritty 54-run stand, which pulled India out of trouble.

"In batting first, we were challenged, the conditions were difficult, but after losing those early wickets, Shubman and Riyan, the way they batter and created the partnership was brilliant," he said.

"When you speak about situational awareness, at that point of time what both of you did was very, very important. That gives us a platform to at least reach to a decent total (to which) our bowlers can make sure and bowl at the right areas," he said.

Hardik lauded Washington Sundar (25 off 18 balls) and Ravi Bishnoi (8) for their respective contributions highlighting the importance of runs from lower order batters.

"I always emphasise on the fact that the lower order has to come and chip in, and Washy and those eight runs by Bishi (Ravi Bishnoi) was very important," he said.

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