Chris Gayle’s fastest T20 century record broken by a T&T batsman who gets to the milestone in 21 balls

The ‘Universe Boss’ Chris Gayle’s T20 heroics are well known. The big Jamaican was the owner of the fastest T20 century, which he had scored in just 30 balls, until recently. But the king has been dethroned by a young lad from the Caribbean region, who has broken Gayle’s record and bettered it by nine deliveries.

Trinidad and Tobago (T&T) batsman Iraq Thomas smashed the fastest T20 century when he reached the feat in just 21 balls, thereby breaking Gayle’s record. The 23-year-old batsman from Tobago hit the hundred during a match in the Tobago Cricket Association’s T20 tournament at Louis D’or on Sunday. His unbeaten 31-ball 131 for Scraborough/Mason Hall saw them chase down Speyside’s target of 152 in just eight overs.

According to Trinidad Guardian, Thomas had also played a match earlier in the day before facing Speyside, were he had scored slammed 97 off 53 balls against Charlotteville. Talking about the achievement, the former T&T U-13 player said, “I was just very happy to reach my first T20 century. I have played cricket for a while and to get this century in the shortest format left me very happy. I played for Queen’s Park in Trinidad, so coming into this tournament I had some good experience having played at that level in Trinidad.”

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He went on to add that since the ground was not very big and this gave him the confidence to go after the bowlers. “You can even chase down 180 on this ground because it is not the biggest and it gave me real confidence to go after the bowlers. I never thought I would get the runs as quickly as I did but after hitting a few, I realised that something special can happen out there and it came through,” Thomas said.

Gayle had scored the fastest century for Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) against the now-defunct Sahara Pune Warriors India (PWI) in the 2013 edition of Indian Premier League (IPL) at Bengaluru enroute his majestic knock of 175. Thomas had earlier been one of the two winners of the 2015 Atlantic-Kieron Pollard Scholarship, under which he got a developmental opportunity to play cricket in the United Kingdom (UK) for a two-month period during the summer vacation.