Hardik Pandya is grooving to some music playing in his ear, he is fiddling with his phone, he is joking around with his teammates, but you can see in his body language that he is not just enjoying his time in the Indian dressing room but is hundred per cent committed towards the game and not taking his recent success for granted. He walks past you and gives you that ‘this is how I am’ kind of a smile and gets back to his on-field routine like he has a switch on and switch off button attached to him. Pandya is a character in his own - carefree but diligent, confident but never over confident. He is turning out to be a game-changer for India, something that the Indian team has been wanting in the middle-order for quite some time now. He has won the hearts of batting legends like Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting, who are in awe of his big hitting capabilities. Add India captain MS Dhoni to that list, who was all praise for Hardik’s fearlessness on the field. For Dhoni, Hardik is his ‘see-ball-hit-ball’ kind of a player. “You don’t need to tell him what to do. He just knows one thing - hit the ball. We always wanted somebody like him,” Dhoni said after yet another whirlwind innings by Hardik; this time praising his 18-ball 31 in the first T20I against Bangladesh in the Asia Cup. “Every time he goes in to bat, he is someone who wants to clear the boundary. If he gets going, he will always give you those extra 15-20 odd runs at a good scoring rate. If 160 is a par score, he will help you get to a score of 170 or 175. The more games he plays, the better he will get. He definitely has the skills to clear the boundaries which is difficult to do right from the first delivery.” Pandya echoed his captain’s words and said this is the way he always played his game. “I have got no message from the team or no one has told me that you are supposed to do this or that. I just go with the flow, back my instincts and back my shots to come good,” Pandya told BCCI.TV. “This is my style of play and this is how I have been playing my cricket. I have never been sent in by the team as a pinch-hitter. I believe I am a proper batsman. That is why I am not told by anyone to bat in a particular way. It is a good thing that I am able to score at that pace which is something that the team requires from me.” Rohit Sharma, who shared a quick-fire half century stand with Pandya at a crucial juncture of the match applauded his attitude towards the game. “Hardik came and changed the momentum of the game. He batted fearlessly and scored those 30-odd runs in just 18 balls. He is someone who doesn’t think too much about what’s happening. He just wants to play his game and that is what he did. That is what he has been doing of late; he is just coming and playing his shots. On the field, he is not afraid of anything; he is willing to put that attitude in his game. He is quite pumped up always when he goes to bat or when he walks out to bowl.” But one begins to wonder where he got these skill sets from. Was it a skill set that he was aware of from the beginning or did he develop them over time? Pandya says hitting sixes gave him immense joy every time he held a bat in his hands. “I don’t really know how and where I got my big hitting capabilities from,” answers Pandya. “But, right from my childhood days, it was a habit for me to hit big sixes. I always had this urge to send the ball out of the boundary be it any tournament. Even when I was 16 or 17 and finding my way into competitive cricket, hitting sixes was something that I always wanted to do. Even at that age, I would back myself and follow my instincts. If I would feel that I have to hit the first ball for a six, I would go for it. That is the way I have played and that is the way I play even now. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t, but that is the way it goes.” But when did he feel that he could make this ability his forte? Where did he hone these skills of dispatching cricket balls at will? “It was while playing domestic cricket that I got to realise that I could hit the ball hard and far,” he says. “That was the phase when I got to know about my shots, my strengths. The shots that I am comfortable and uncomfortable playing and the shots that I can bank on to get runs. I got clear in my mind about such small things and I slated a few shots that could prove handy if and when I played international cricket. I am just following those things and hopefully it continues to work for me.” Pandya says he has no role models. But, when it comes to hitting the cricket ball mercilessly, he names two modern day legends who he admires. “I have never had a role model when it comes to hitting sixes but I just look at great players like our captain MS Dhoni and AB de Villiers and other big hitters in the world. I would want to get the consistency that these two players have. They have been among the most dangerous players right since I have been watching cricket. I want to learn the way they hit the ball and would grab that skill from them. “I love the way Dhoni maintains his posture while going for those big shots. and it is something I would want to learn from him. His positions are rock solid and his hands move swiftly when it comes to executing power hitting. Hopefully I can take such skills and imbibe them in my game and I could become a better player.”