As Daryl Mitchell sat down to front India’s media, having just anchored the Black Caps’ seven-wicket victory in Rajkot, the first set of questions put to him pinpointed exactly how underrated New Zealand’s No 4 is.

“Do you have any comments on KL Rahul’s innings?”

While Mitchell had walked off with an unbeaten 131 runs in New Zealand’s 286-3, Indian wicketkeeper Rahul had made 112 not out in defeat.

Walking to the wicket at 99-2, Mitchell adeptly handled India’s spinners to reach 50 in just 52 balls, and needed another 44 to turn that into triple figures.

Considering the Black Caps have never won a One-Day International (ODI) series in India, victory in Rajkot puts them within touching distance of history, heading to Indore on Sunday.

The three-match series is now 1-1 after New Zealand lost the first game.

And yet, as Mitchell’s press conference quickly showed, the focus continues to revolve around India, given the huge audience their team brings to the sport.

It’s symptomatic not just of cricket’s commercial interests, but of how Mitchell has slipped under the radar as an all-format player.

This was his eighth ODI century, in just 58 matches - all batting in the middle order. Of those eight, three have come against India, in foreign conditions.

Now with a stranglehold of the No 4 spot vacated by Ross Taylor – arguably New Zealand’s greatest ODI batter – Mitchell’s average of 56.73 runs per innings is a marked improvement on his predecessor.

Despite that, the 34-year-old’s place as one of the game’s modern white-ball titans seems to be consistently overlooked.

At last month’s Indian Premier League auction, Mitchell was ignored at a base price of roughly NZ$386,000. At the same time, Australia’s Cameron Green and England’s Liam Livingstone, both with inferior all-format records to Mitchell, sold for $4.78 million and $2.5m respectively.

Mitchell, though, doesn’t play for money. After being forced to wait until his late 20s to play for the Black Caps, he knows where his priorities lie.

“I just love playing for my country,” he said after the match. “I love travelling the world and playing international cricket.

New Zealand's Daryl Mitchell celebrates after scoring a century during the second one-day international (ODI) cricket match between India and New Zealand in Rajkot, western India. Photo / AFP

“I’m very lucky to do that across all three formats. My job is to help us win games of cricket, and luckily I was able to do that tonight.”

The Rajkot victory was by no means a one-man performance, though.

Mitchell combined in stands of 162 with Will Young (87) and an unbroken 78 from 58 balls with Glenn Phillips (32 not out).

Young’s efforts in particular should give the Black Caps reason to smile.

The 33-year-old was one of just two players to take part in every ODI New Zealand played in 2025, along with stand-in captain Michael Bracewell.

In those 18 matches, though, he managed just 320 runs at an average of less than 19. Tellingly, of those runs, 107 came in one innings against Pakistan.

Batting in a No 3 spot that has long been Kane Williamson’s by right, Young’s display in Rajkot will be a significant weight off his shoulders.

Mitchell understood exactly how important Young’s contribution was.

“I love batting with Youngy,” he said. “We’ve done it several times now.

“We have some good fun while we’re out there, but we also get in the contest and get pretty competitive with the opposition.

“The way Youngy played today was brilliant. He soaked up the new ball, which looked challenging. He was able to find ways to keep rotating [the strike] and getting the odd boundary here and there.

“It was seriously good fun batting with him, and nice to get the job done.”

Alex Powell is a sports journalist for the NZ Herald. He has been a sports journalist since 2016.