17-year-old Prithvi Shaw scores fourth century in five first-class matches

New Delhi: Mumbai's Prithvi Shaw has taken the cricket world by storm. The 17-year-old on Wednesday hit his fourth First-class hundred on Day One of his team’s Ranji Trophy Group C fixture against Odisha in Bhubaneshwar.

Put into bat, Mumbai lost opener Akhil Herwadkar in the sixth over, but Shaw and Ajinkya Rahane steadied the innings. Shaw scored a fluent 105 off 153 balls with the help of 18 fours, while Rahane scored 49.

He departed in the 44thj over, trapped lbw Basant Mohanty.

Incidentally, this was Shaw's fifth First-class match, and he already has five centuries.

Last week, against Tamil Nadu, Shaw scored his third hundred, a 155-ball 123 at Mumbai. Before that the opening batsman hit 154 off 249 balls for India Red in their Duleep Trophy match against India Blue at Lucknow.

Earlier, he had scored 120 against Tamil Nadu in their Ranji match.

But the record for most First-class 100s before the age of 18 by an Indian batsman still belongs to Sachin Tendulkar, who had seven. Ambati Rayudu also hit four First-class hundreds before turning 18.

Shaw now has 552 First-class runs at an average of 69 with four hundreds and a fifty.

Shaw will celebrate his 18th birthday on November 9.