Attacking India opener Abhishek Sharma added another unwanted chapter to his 2026 season on Tuesday, September 22, falling for a first-ball duck in the historic one-off T20I against Japan at Sano International Cricket Ground in Kanto.
India captain Shreyas Iyer won the toss and chose to bat. The rain-affected contest was reduced to five overs a side. Sanju Samson faced the first five balls before Abhishek came on strike.
He entered the Japan match as one of the most explosive openers in world cricket. He has piled up big scores and broken records, yet the ducks have piled up just as quickly – in the T20 World Cup, IPL, and now bilateral cricket. Ten ducks in one year is an outlier even for a high-risk, high-reward opener who regularly faces the new ball.
Just five days earlier, Sharma had smashed a 30-ball century against Afghanistan in Delhi, one of the fastest T20I hundreds by a player from a Full Member nation. Sharma’s 2026 has been a strange mix of brilliance and collapse.
