3 min readMar 22, 2026 09:57 PM IST
In a 28-second video of an intra-squad match, Abhishek Sharma is seen putting the bowlers to sword. He is sashaying down the deck, manufacturing room and carving the bowlers through covers, slashing, slapping and scything with a pre-World Cup swagger. Above the video is a caption: “Puli was on fire yesterday.”
Puli means a tiger in Telugu (though in Tamil and Malayalam, it means leopards). The emoji to the caption, too, was a tiger. In local parlance, puli is referred to anyone who is daring, or shows courage. Hyderabad, of course, is the (cricketing) home of Indian cricket’s real “Tiger”, the inimitable Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi.
The reference “puli’ though puzzled, because it has not been a popular (localised) epithet for him, like “thala” for MS Dhoni, or “chetta” for Sanju Samson. Or the less localised versions like Hitman (Rohit Sharma), Kung-fu Pandya (Hardik) and the alliterative Boom Boom Bumrah (Jasprit). Last season, some of the Youtubers from Hyderabad even conducted a poll to find a moniker for their team’s batting talisman. Star Sports, the hosts broadcasters too discussed, with Harbhajan Singh calling him “Shera Sharma.” The others were unimaginative ones like “Su-par Sharma”, “Slayer-Sharma”, “Baby Hitman”, “Mr. Maximum”, among others. None had a local connection. For a while, some called him “Baahubali”, an obvious reference to the epic action drama, before it ran into copyright concerns.
Puli ante Orange Army ki heartbeat 🐯🧡
SRH Fan Meet & Greet lo mana Abhi sweet moments 🧡🫶🏻 pic.twitter.com/gusegw3s7w
— SunRisers Hyderabad (@SunRisers) March 22, 2026
The genesis of the nickname is uncertain (and most likely a marketing trick), but SRH has been going overdrive in drilling the name. A few weeks ago, there was an eleven-second ad, where a tiger, bizarrely, gliding on a shiny tiled surface is shown. In a more audacious ad, he is shown walking stealthily like the big cat, flashes of which are interposed. Then he sits on a throne, leg on leg, the song Aaya Sher from the movie Paradise blasting in the background. Soon, an enormous tiger took staccato steps and perched beside the throne. A plume of fire covers the screen and the warning is fired: “Fire Hecharika”. Or fire is here.
Every caption related to him features “Puli”. Like “Welcome back, puli.” “Our Puli has arrived.” In another video all-rounder Nitish Kumar Reddy, seated on stage, is seen chanting “puli, puli….” and welcoming him. Another goes: “Puli atho dangerous beta!” Puli is dangerous, literally translated.
The wizened fans, though, would hope that he recreates the sinister form he showed in the intra-squad match rather than the patchy touch of the World Cup minus the final. They would hope their “puli” would roar.
