LOOKING BACK FIVE KEY TAKEAWAYS
The Indian Premier League 2023 has been probably one of the most-riveting seasons in the history of the franchise league.
Gulf News takes a look at the five key lessons learnt from the season:
1 Controversies that marred an exciting season of cricket
While the standard of the game was at the highest level, the fair play must have hit a low-point this season. One incident sticks out like a sore thumb. The spat during the match between Lucknow Super Giants and Royal Challengers Bangalore spilled even after the match ended. The three players involved in the ugly spat, Virat Kohli, Gautam Gambhir and Naveen Ul Haq, all were slapped hefty fines.
2 Big money does not necessarily mean results
Once again it was the case of big money earners giving too little back to their respective teams. England all-rounders Sam Curran (Rs185 million) and Ben Stokes (Rs162.5 million) were among the highest earners during the auction for IPL 2023, but they did very little.
On the contrary, cheap purchases like Ajinkya Rahane and Mohit Sharma have proved more than their money’s worth.
3 Chennai and Mumbai are still dominant forces
The new season saw Chennai hitting the ground running early with a clear strategy and the designated roles for individuals. Rahane and Sivam Dube were different players this season while Tushar Deshpande, who was the third-choice pacer, stood up to be counted while the young Pathirana, dubbed Baby Malinga, has become the fearsome deathover specialist.
Mumbai, who had a slow start, were unstoppable when they found their groove near the halfway stage. They have also unearthed some impressive talents like Nehal Wadhera, Tilak Varma, Vishnu Vinod and Akash Madhwal.
4 Slower ones are not a weapon anymore
Until last season the slower ones were a potent variation, but this season the batters have been waiting for the slower ones. Each and every bowler is analysed threadbare and the batters are well armed with the information that they get from the support staff on how many slower deliveries one can expect during the early overs and similarly in the death overs. Based on that they choose their spots to hit the bowler. One big casualty in this season is Harshal Patel, who had many slow variations, but he was least effective this season as his bowling was completely exposed.
5 Impact-player rule
A masterstroke that has made this IPL a high-scoring contest: 38 innings saw a total in excess of 200 runs during the 74 matches held at 12 venues, that includes 214 in final. Generally the battered wickets and the low-bounce wickets make batting difficult, resulting in low scores. But the true batting wickets, clubbed with the extra batter allowed the teams to go after the bowling harder, resulting in bigger scores this season with 12 centuries.