4 Reasons why Delhi Capitals (DC) can win their first IPL in 2020

A team which should have won the IPL multiple times with the players they have had in their team over the years is Delhi Capitals(earlier Daredevils). Unfortunately, they haven’t even reached a single final and have rather had a very dubious record finishing at the bottom of the table 4 times, and have qualified for playoffs only 4 times in 12 years.

They have had the likes of Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, David Warner, Ab de Villiers, Yuvraj Singh and a number of stars in their teams. The list is endless. Yet, they have let all those players go very easily, after just one average season not recognising their potential.

Gambhir after being let go by Delhi in 2011, led Kolkata Knight Riders to two titles in 4 years. Warner after being let go in 2014, despite having put in commendable performances over 5 seasons, has easily been one of the best batsmen since, also leading SRH to glory in 2016 and de Villiers has been one of the most impactful players of the last decade.

Poor selection strategy, not backing players and a general lack of clarity as to what kind of a team they want to build cost Delhi severely across seasons. In 2018, they bought back Gautam Gambhir as captain and Ricky Ponting as their coach in a bid to change their fortunes.

Tragically for them, Gambhir seemed to be nowhere his best in the initial games and eventually took the bold decision of dropping himself. The young and talented Shreyas Iyer, who himself was finding form, was thrust into captaincy out of nowhere but did a good job to win a few games in the latter stages although Delhi finished last again. It was expected he would be replaced by a more senior and experienced player as captain in the next season.

However, the management once again surprised everyone by sticking with Iyer. This, however, turned out to be a masterstroke. Delhi returned as Capitals and not Daredevils for the 2019 season, with a new jersey and logo, looking to start afresh with a new captain leading the way.

And they had a phenomenal season. The young team played with a lot of heart and put in fantastic performances winning 9 of their 14 games and Delhi entered playoffs after a long wait of 7 years. They, however, lost to Chennai Super Kings in the Qualifier 2. But Delhi made a couple of useful trades, and with a good auction strategy, they have covered a few more bases for the upcoming season.

Let’s have a look at 4 reasons why Delhi can win their first IPL trophy in 2020:

1. Strong Indian core

While Delhi had a strong overall team last year, what they missed was a strong Indian core, especially in terms of experience. The team had the likes of Shikhar Dhawan and Amit Mishra and a young bunch of batsmen in Prithvi Shaw, Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer, but a few more calm and composed players were needed, especially in crunch situations when the youngsters would get carried away easily.

We have seen over the years, the team which generally possess the strongest Indian players, be it Chennai Super Kings in the early years, or Mumbai Indians recently, is usually the team which has an upper hand in the IPL. Delhi have managed to secure the services of 2 of the best in the business and will be hoping for a big contribution from them on and off the field.

Ravichandran Ashwin and Ajinkya Rahane— two very experienced India internationals who have also played a lot of IPL, will add the much-needed stability in the team. The youngsters are also bound to benefit immensely as they will have two intelligent cricketing brains to pick from and learn from their experiences. Ashwin and Rahane are both astute thinkers of the game and now with their addition, Delhi seems to possess perhaps one of the finest Indian cores in the IPL, and they have perhaps found the missing link that now connects them to the trophy.

2. Shreyas Iyer – A more experienced player

Last season was Iyer’s first as a full-fledged captain of an IPL team. While he did a great job, he was still learning a lot with each passing game. He was a youngster who had to captain veterans like Shikhar Dhawan, Amit Mishra and international stars like Kagiso Rabada. Also, having to face captains like MS Dhoni, Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, all his seniors, would have been an intimidating experience for him, especially since he hadn’t played a lot for India.

Things have however changed for him in the last year. After the Cricket World Cup, Iyer was brought back into the team, and he looked at more ease this time as compared to his early days in 2017.

Over a period of 6-8 months, he firmly established his position in the limited-overs set-up, especially ODIs, where India had been looking for an apt number 4 since eternity. He scored 537 runs in 11 ODI games last year, including a 100 in New Zealand. He also scored 334 runs in 14 T20I games, finishing a number of games for the team.

Over this period, Iyer would have surely learnt a lot from the other senior players in the team about captaincy, tactics, handling pressure as well as a team. He is going to return more self- assured, more confident in his abilities not just as a player but also as the captain and that is surely going to bode well for the entire team.

3. Quality bowling attack

It is often said, batsmen win you matches but bowlers win you tournaments. And Delhi have in their arsenal several quality bowlers with a lot of variety and bundle of experience.

Delhi possessed a versatile and strong bowling line up last year as well having  Kagiso Rabada, Trent Boult, Chris Morris and Ishant Sharma in their pace bowling while their spin department primarily consisted of Amit Mishra, a leg spinner, Axar Patel, a tall left-arm spinner and another talented leggie, Sandeep Lamichanne, the only player to play in the IPL from Nepal.

But playing at the Feroz Shah Kotla ground, Delhi Capitals’ pace attack was monotonous with a lot of hit the deck bowlers; not having someone with useful cutters and slower balls to exploit the slow nature of the pitch and needed an off-spinner to complete their spin department.

Good strategies brought in Ravichandran Ashwin, one of the best off-spinners of our times and Mohit Sharma, a very clever bowler with several variations up his sleeve, someone who has been very effective on slower pitches along with Chris Woakes a very capable powerplay bowler.

Luckily for the team from Delhi, the IPL has been shifted to UAE, where pitches are similar to those in their home turf. The Capitals perhaps have best-suited bowling attack for the new conditions and will bank on the experience and variety of their bowlers to produce match-winning performances by making it difficult for the opposition batsmen.

4. Experience of playing in playoffs

Delhi Capitals started off the 2019 season with the hope of improving their record from the past few seasons. For a team which had consistently finished in the bottom half of the table, anything apart from the bottom two would have been an improvement. There weren’t many expectations from them as such in the group stage, and they utilised that to their advantage of playing their cricket freely, and that led them to emphatically enter the playoffs.

A very underrated aspect of winning big tournaments is being in high-pressure situations time and time again. The knockout stages are a different ball game altogether. Once you enter that phase, whatever you have done in the group stages becomes meaningless and it all boils down to managing pressure and expectations on that day. And that is never easy for any team.

Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians both lost the first finals they played in. Royal Challengers Bangalore has lost 3 finals. Hence it was an even greater challenge for this young Delhi team. And while they beat Sunrisers Hyderabad in the Eliminator thanks largely to the brilliance of Rishabh Pant, they came up short against CSK in Qualifier 2, a team which knew what they were doing in every phase of the match as they had players who had been in the high-pressure situation several times.

Things will be different this time around. The team would be better prepared in the playoffs having taken lessons from last time. They would not be overwhelmed by the situation,  and would surely be better prepared tactically and mentally as well.

Delhi Capitals have a lot of things going for them this year and are very strong contenders for the trophy.