The Indian Cricket Board could be bossing around for what they bring to the table, including engagement and revenue profit; they cannot overlook the fact that not even a single T20 World Cup-bound first-team player will play the IPL 2024 Final on Sunday in Chennai, reflecting their state in the shortest format. With SunRisers Hyderabad slated to face Kolkata Knight Riders in the showdown clash, only Rinku Singh (travelling reserve) will feature in the final.
The Indian players struggled to get going this season, barring a few like Virat Kohli and ace seamer Jasprit Bumrah. While India’s top-order, including captain Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Suryakumar Yadav and even Kohli, completed a hundred this season, none could propel their side to break into the final two in IPL 2024.
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Talking about the four all-rounders, only Shivam Dube was among the runs; neither Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel nor Team India’s vice-captain Hardik Pandya contributed enough to part of any conversation. What’s worse, Jadeja picked just eight wickets this season, and Patel and Pandya returned with 11 wickets each.
The only silver lining here is Kuldeep and Chahal’s form, as both picked 16 and 18 wickets, respectively. In the pace-bowling department, Bumrah leads the pack with 20 wickets in 13 contested matches, with Arshdeep Singh (19) and Mohammed Siraj (15) following him.
The bonus, however, is Rishabh Pant and Sanju Samson’s form, who scored 446 and 531 runs, respectively. Although Pant didn’t look in his element this season, given he returned from a major injury, and understandably so, Samsom’s form at three was a boom for Rajasthan Royals, who exited the tournament following losing to SRH in Qualifier 2.
Missed opportunity
With India naming a relatively similar-looking batting line-up they picked in 2021, they seemed to have missed a chance of picking some young guns; the prime examples of those are top run-getters – Ruturaj Gaikwad (583 runs), Riyan Parag (573) and Abhishek Sharma (482). KL Rahul (520 runs) and youngster Sai Sudharsan (527) are the notable absentees.
In the bowling department, Avesh Khan (19 wickets) tops the list of bowlers going into the World Cup (travelling reserve). T Natarajan (19), Harshal Patel (24) and Varun Chakaravarthy (20) failed to make it to the T20 World Cup squad.
Meanwhile, the Men in Blue will travel to the Americas for the 20-team tournament starting June 2. India will play only one warm-up game against Bangladesh on June 1.
India is placed in Group A alongside arch-rivals Pakistan, co-hosts USA, Canada and Ireland. Rohit Sharma-led Indian Team will open their account against Ireland on June 5 and play Pakistan in the marquee clash on Sunday (June 9) in New York.
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