mumbai the strifetorn state of jammu and kashmir had something good to celebrate on sunday eveningthe mumbai indians sprang a surprise in their opening match of ipl12 against the delhi capitals at the wankhede stadium here when they gave a give debut to 17yearold pacer rasikh salam who comes from a small village called ashmuji in kulgaam district of south kashmir ipl schedulerasikh was picked up by mi in the player auction in december in jaipur for his base price of rs 20 lakhs at 17 years and 353 days hes is the youngestever player to make his debut for mi the previousyoungest debutant for mi was indias chinaman bowler kuldeep yadav who played in the 2010 edition at the age of 17 years one month and 20 days rasikh is the second player from jammu kashmir to play in the ipl after offspinner pervez rasool who played for sunrisers hyderabad and pune warriors india manzoor dar was picked up by kings xi punjab last year but didnt get a gameat the pretournament presser former india seamer zaheer khan whos joined mi this season as the teams director cricket operations had named salam and himachal pradeshs pankaj jaiswal as the new players to watch out for this season mi skipper rohit sharma in fact entrusted rasikh the first over of the match itself throwing him into the deep end right awayrasikh began by beating dc and india opener shikhar dhawan with a beautiful outswinger bowled at 131 kmph impressing with his smooth action the teenaged seamer conceded six in his first over after taking a catch at third man rasikh returned to bowl the final over of the innings where he was taken apart by a rampaging rishabh pant who smashed him for two sixes and a four his final over went for 20 runs with pant alone hitting 19 of them overall he went for 42 runs in four overs without taking a wicketrasikh was first spotted by former india allrounder irfan pathan who was jks captain and mentor last season during a talent hunt where young cricketers from various districts of the state had comeits a really happy moment for me i first saw him in district selection trials in jk where i saw 600 to 700 boys after he had bowled just a couple of balls i knew that this guy has something special i didnt let him bowl after that in that selection trial pathan told toi on saturdayexplaining how he helped the talented but raw young gun develop as a cricketer pathan said i took him under my wings i looked after his training since he hasnt done any strength training in his life before so i used to send him a few videos of strengthening he lunges squats and how to do pushups core and etc i made sure that i took him for the vizzy trophy which is a practice tournament before the domestic season after that i sent him to play