The Fourth Innings

For the second consecutive time this IPL season, KKR have managed to defend a score quite comfortably ( v SRH and v MI ). They say defending a total is the most difficult aspect of T20 cricket which is why most captains have opted to bowl first in previous editions of the IPL. Yesterday KKR captain Shreyas Iyer opted to bat first and that I think set the tone for rest of the match. KKR looked very strong after the completion of the IPL Auction 2022. They turned that into performances winning three of their first four matches before suffering a five-match losing streak, before winning v RR . Cricket, or rather sport in general, is all about momentum and Kolkata had clearly lost it midway through the tournament. Their top order was failing, Shreyas Iyer and Nitish Rana were inconsistent and most of their bowlers leaked runs. While people like Andre Russell, Sunil Narine and Umesh Yadav had been excellent, other international cricketers like Pat Cummins and Aaron Finch produced ordinary ...

A chase of  210  is always challenging in T20 cricket. But when you have a lineup as strong as RCB does in IPL 2022, you are expected to do better than lose by 54 runs. Credit to the Punjab bowlers for sticking to their plans and backing an excellent performance by their batters. But RCB...oh...RCB, is this another one of those years? They say nothing hurts more badly than a false hope. I feel for RCB fans right now. Year after year, the promise of a new dawn, but the same old issues haunting them. Sometimes I wonder if we could associate the word "chokers" with this IPL franchise. Seven Playoffs and three  IPL finals, yet no trophy to show. Let's not dive too much into the past and focus on this year. The only issue that came up after this year's mega auction was that RCB would have to play atleast two inexperienced batters in their top seven. After giving ample opportunities to Anuj Rawat, they have now settled on Rajat Patidar and Mahipal Lomror, with Shahbaz Ahmed...

Cricket | T20 | IPL | CSK | SRH | MI | DC | KKR | RCB  In this cricket article, I have analysed successful IPL franchises during the 2018-21 period, including but not limited to title winners. Potentially answering the question: How to win the toughest T20 league in the world? , this piece presents what sort of things have actually worked for the teams. Keeping relevance in mind, I have decided to limit my analysis to the latest four-year cycle of the cricket league. A Prolific Top Order CSK ( IPL 2018, IPL 2021 ) Both the times the Chennai Super Kings have won the IPL in the last four-year cycle, one constant has been the huge amount of runs scored by their top order. Ambati Rayudu, Shane Watson, Faf du Plessis, Ruturaj Gaikwad and to an extent Suresh Raina have contributed heavily with the bat in CSK's title-winning runs. Though many were skeptical of Rayudu 's inclusion in the CSK squad, MS Dhoni was confident in his ability to hit both pace and spin as he had a wonderful I...

Cricket | Test | ODI | T20I | India | Captaincy | Virat Kohli  Virat Kohli recently stepped down as India captain in Test cricket. Following are the announcements leading up to it. "....... I've decided to step down as the T20 Captain after this T20 World Cup in Dubai in October." It made sense thanks to his immense workload and a proven leader in Rohit in the waiting.  "This is going to be my last leg in the IPL as captain of RCB." This was coming, since the IPL workload is much greater as compared to T20 Internationals. "Bottom line - there can't be two white-ball captains", said Sourav Ganguly, justifying Rohit's ascent to ODI captaincy when Kohli still wanted to continue as leader. Fair enough, makes sense to have a clear distinction between white-ball and red-ball captaincy. I thought the above events may finally allow Kohli to become the world-beating Test captain we all knew he was going to be and make India a long-format dominator acro...

Cricket | Test | Australia Tour of Pakistan, 2022 | Australia | Pakistan | Preview It's been 24 years since an Australian cricket team last toured Pakistan. It was quite the tour for them, winning their first series in the country since 1959. With both the teams coming off recent series wins, we can expect some fierce action and thrilling drama as the teams walk out on the fourth of March. Let us see how the Australians are shaping up for this one. Australia's new (and old) opening pair David Warner and Usman Khawaja, a partnership that goes way back, 28 years to be precise. Not long ago was Khawaja looked upon as a middle-order batsman. There came the fourth Ashes Test and he stunned the world with a century on comeback. Then he did it again , both times batting at number five. He was pretty much undroppable after that, but so was Travis Head who he had replaced in the first place. So come Hobart , Australia left out Marcus Harris to accomodate both Khawaja and Head, the for...

Cricket | Test | Ashes 2021-22  | England | Australia | Fourth Test, Sydney 6 balls to survive. 1 wicket in hand. Fading light and pride at stake. Test cricket's leading wicket-taker among pacers set to go up against a batter, who many consider second only to the Don. Cricket doesn't get any better. But, hold on, the roles have been reversed. It's Steve Smith with the cherry in hand and Jimmy Anderson taking his guard to face him. Still, whoaaa....!!! Anything could happen. Test cricket doesn't get any better..... When Zak Crawley and Haseeb Hameed walked out to bat this morning, they had already put on England's best opening partnership on this tour. But their team needed more. After all, surviving over 90 overs on a Day 5 Sydney pitch is not considered easy in cricket.  India managed to do it  around the same time last year, but that was down to immense grit and fortune. To be honest, this England batting line-up doesn't give too much confidence to its fans. W...