Bumrah amongst the wickets yet Mumbai Indians lost the game. Pant’s lack of impact. Conway’s tribute to Dhoni for helping him play spin. DK’s continued impact in the final overs. Finally, who is the leading contender for the title? I will try to quickly analyse the latest events in the IPL.
Last night, Bumrah took 5 for 10 in 4 overs. Outstanding bowling figures. Yet, Mumbai Indians lost the game by a fair margin. MI is anyway out of the competition and it does not really matter whether they win this game or otherwise. All they can do is try and finish one or two places above from the bottom. The point I am trying to make is why is Bumrah still allowed to play in all the games by Rohit Sharma despite knowing fully well that they are not going to progress any further in the competition? When Bumrah can afford to skip games for the country, what is the point in him playing for afterall a franchise which serves no purpose? For that matter, why is Rohit Sharma himself still continuing to play in all the games? India’s schedule over the next few months is completely packed.
Games that matter are ahead for India
Limited overs series against South Africa, final test against England, World T20 and other series. We need all the important players at the top of their form and free of injury atleast for the last test in England and for the World T20 but what is happening here is that these players are made to exhaust themselves in meaningless games. If Rohit or Bumrah or both of them is injured and out for several months, we can kiss our chances in England and Australia goodbye.
It is also the responsibility of the various franchise’s to ensure the interests of Indian cricket as being paramount. However, who will tell them? The board?
Rishabh Pant’s lack of impact
The pressure of being the captain seems to be weighing heavily on the shoulders of Pant. He is yet to play a substantial innings for his team, Delhi Capitals despite the fact that when he arrives at the crease, he is still left with fair number of overs to build an innings. In some of the games, he gets a starts and then gets out almost immediately. His inability in the middle order is one of the reason for Delhi’s poor showing in this tournament. They can still qualify for the playoff but it will take a miracle for them to win the tournament.
Conway’s praise for Dhoni
“I have got to give credit to MS tonight,” Conway told Star Sports. “In the last game I swept quite a lot, and I unfortunately got out playing the sweep. And he said to me, ‘I think the guys are going to try to bowl fuller to you tonight. So maybe come out and try to hit them straight.’ So he sort of gave me the guidelines to try to execute that. That’s what I tried to do.”
Whether Conway will be able to play spin better in a Test match is open to question but Dhoni seems to have had an effect on Conway’s batting. It will help him in the remaining games and perhaps, next year, he can make a lot of significant contributions to CSK.
DK’s continued impact in the final overs
A couple of days ago, against a good SRH attack, Dinesh Karthik scored 30 runs at a blistering speed. It came of just 8 deliveries. It proved to be the difference between a middling RCB total and an impregnable one. He must have been adjudged the man of the match but it was Wanindu Hasaranga who took that honours for an impressive spell but without DK’s runs, SRH would have been much more comfortable in chasing the score that RCB would have ended up with.
Anyway, the point is, DK has been hitting at will that he has posed a real question to the Indian selectors. He is not only banging on the door he has literally broken the door. It is tough for the selectors to overlook Karthik for the World T20. With Ishan Kishan not performing that well at the top and Karthik’s belligerence at the end of the innings, it is impossible to ignore him. It is another question whether Karthik will find a spot in the playing eleven with Shreyas Iyer & Surya manning the middle order and the Indian team will surely want to fit in a batsman who can also bowl. Does anyone know whether Karthik can bowl?
Who among the teams is currently the strongest contender?
It has to be Gujarat Titans. They are currently head and shoulders above everyone else. The manner in which they dismissed Lucknow a couple of nights ago shows how much better they are than the rest. They have multiple match winners in Tewatia, Miller, Shubnam Gill, Rashid Khan and Hardik Pandya himself. Their spinners are good and fast bowlers are decent enough. They certainly are the front runners.
Lucknow Super Giants on the otherhand are dependent on the opening combination of Rahul and Quinton. If either or both of them get out early, they will struggle to post a high score or chase a big score. Nonetheless, if Rahul stays at the wicket long enough, Lucknow is sure to challenge Gujarat
Rajasthan Royals is a one man show. Jos Buttler. With 3 hundreds already, he is capable of destroying the opposition on his day. Rajasthan will sincerely hope that he has two of those days in the playoffs to get them to the final.
The last team that is likely to qualify for the playoffs is Royal Challengers Bangalore. However, they are sort of a mixed bag. Too good on their day and awful on the other days. It requires Kohli at his absolute best for them to be able to life the cup and also a DK to be at his belligerent best. With Kohli woefully out of form, it do not think that it is easy for RCB. I expect them to face Rajasthan in the eliminator and they must prevail but for the 2nd eliminator, they will have to bat out of their skins. Batting has so far been their primary problem. Bowlers have done reasonably well.
These are the latest events from the IPL.