6 players who came back in IPL after a dip in middle seasons

The Indian Premier League (IPL) for most is about the instant. You desire something either on behalf of the batsman or the bowler and it is delivered in favour of either of the contesting team. Those whose wish gets fulfilled live the moment while for others, it’s a moment of despair. The reverse can happen the next day, undoing the memory of the past 24 hours. This is what makes the IPL a superhit carnival. People are never bored and find excitement always.

However, though for some players and the audience at large this rule holds true, the IPL also features players for whom this tournament is a test of character, continuity and tenacity. Put in another way, while the ‘instant’ is the IPL’s USP, there are players who have proved over the years that class can be reasserted after a temporary lapse and that can be done on the stage of the IPL.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni: The evergreen cricketer

To take names of such players who have grown better like old wine, first is the evergreen Mahendra Singh Dhoni. India’s best captain in terms of statistics, Dhoni has been a consistent name in the IPL over the years.

He had almost backed his World Cup victory in T20 in 2007 with his first-ever IPL title for Chennai Super Kings but got stuck in the final. He then became the first captain to lift two consecutive IPL trophies in 2010 and 2011 but then lost three finals in the next four years as the CSK skipper and once as a player of Rising Pune Supergiant (2017) when CSK remained suspended. Dhoni had a good run till the 2013 IPL when he scored 13 fifties in six editions with an impressive strike rate.

But after 2013, Dhoni’s form did appear a bit rusted as he produced only four fifties in the next four tournaments with his strike rate touching its lowest of 116 in 2017. But Dhoni is back to form in the current edition in which he is captaining CSK for the ninth time after two-year hiatus. The 36-year-old has scored 360 runs in 10 games in IPL 11 and is 101 run short of his best tally of 461 (in 18 games) registered in 2013. He also averages 90 and averages 165-plus this year which is by far his best till date. Dhoni has also slammed 27 sixes in 2018, two more than his previous best of 2013, and this batting display came following his less-than impressive show in the one-day international and T20 series versus South Africa earlier this year.

You write off Chris Gayle at your own peril

The second is Chris Gayle. The ballistic left-hander had finished as the top scorer in the IPL in more than one edition and has played some of the best knocks in the annual gala over the years. But he was surprisingly ignored by his teams – Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) – he has played for in the IPL till 2017.

KKR’s yet ignored him while he was yet to come to his destructive best but it was difficult to gauge why RCB overlooked him for the 2018 edition despite he serving them well over the past several seasons – slamming six hundreds including an incredible 175 not out and also chipping in with the ball numerous times to give the Royal Challengers many wins.

Gayle’s form took a nosedive after the 2012 and 2013 editions when he slammed consecutive 700-plus runs and his tallies between 2014 and 2017 editions read as 196, 491, 227 and 200, respectively. While he hit four hundreds between 2011 and 2013, he managed just one between 2014 and 2017. His average, strike rate and number of sixes also plummeted and it was being believed that the player in his mid-30s started to fade.

But as a true champion, Gayle was back in the 2018 edition, this time for Kings XI Punjab, who picked the man at the dying moments. He hit his sixth IPL hundred against a strong bowling unit like Sunrisers Hyderabad besides tonking others (three fifties) in his known fashion. Gayle has scored 310 runs in 6 games for the Kings this year which means although it is difficult for him to beat the top scorer but a judicious use of the ageing tiger would see him serving Ravichandran Ashwin’s team for a long haul. Gayle did not have a great time either in the New Zealand series in January and 2019 World Cup qualifier in Zimbabwe in March where he hit just one hundred against the UAE. But when all started writing him off, Gayle showed his mettle.

Shane Watson is as effective post-retirement

Shane Watson is technically a retired player but he somehow loves the IPL and has proved his worth on its stage time and again. The 36-year-old all-rounder, who has struggled with his fitness over the years, played his last Test and one-day international in 2015 and T20 international in 2016. But that Watson is not a spent force in cricket was reasserted in IPL 11 where he has been playing impressively for Chennai Super Kings (CSK). Although his bowling hasn’t clicked as he would like, Watson has hit 328 runs in 10 matches this IPL, bringing back the memories of the 2008 and 2013 editions when he was picked as the man of the match for his all-round ability.

Watson played for Rajasthan Royals then and two years ago, he was bought by RCB and found himself in CSK following an intense battle between Delhi Daredevils (DD), RCB and CSK which proved how much still teams depend on this athletic all-rounder. He has also slammed a hundred against his old team RR this season besides a fifty, having the best strike rate since 2010 and has lofted the ball outside the ropes 21 times already, which is just one short of his 2013 tally.

The 2008 edition had helped Watson emerge as a fitter player and he made a comeback to the Australian national side. Eight years since then, Watson still shows that he is a force and can jolly well bid for a comeback to the national side, especially when the national side is going through a rough patch. You can never ignore these talents.

Trent Boult has made his name in IPL after 4 years

The left-arm fast medium New Zealander has been playing the IPL since 2015 but never did he play as good as he is in the 2018 edition even though his team, DD, are clearly struggling to qualify for the playoffs. The 28-year-old has grabbed 13 wickets in 10 matches this season, which puts him at joint second with Mumbai Indians’ (MI) Mayank Markande and RCB’s Umesh Yadav.

Boult, an effective new ball bowler for the Black Caps, made his IPL debut for SRH in 2015 but in the first three editions, he could manage 15 scalps in 13 games with strike rates of 18-plus, 24 and 28-plus. His averages in the last three years were 26-plus, 39 and 43.20.

This year, Boult’s strike rate reads 17 and average 25.38 which shows how much the bowler has improved in this format. Boult is the fifth highest wicket-taker for New Zealand in T20 internationals (37 in 25 matches) and had a good outing in the Trans-Tasman Tri-series played in Australia and New Zealand in February with 8 wickets in 5 games.

Boult was released by his former team SRH in 2016 to pave way for Mustafizur Rahaman who played a key role in their title triumph in 2016. Boult then had a one year stint with KKR in 2017 after the Kolkata franchise bought him for Rs 5 crore and he also showed his mettle as a fielder. But he ended up with the third team in the IPL this year and DD’s former captain Gautam Gambhir, who spent one season with Boult in KKR, said the latter is the best left-arm fast bowler in the world at the moment.

Ambati Rayudu scales to the top in his ninth IPL

Thirty-two-year-old Ambati Rayudu is a name that the Indian national team has occasionally featured in the last five years (but the man averages above 50 and has two hundreds in 34 one-day internationals) but he has been a big name in both the domestic circuit as well as the IPL. The right-hander had been a regular for MI and served the blue jerseys well before shifting to CSK where he has been playing the role of a floater between the top and middle order.

But Rayudu, whose injury in the 2017 edition saw him getting carried off from the ground on a stretcher, has stood up to his duties well in this edition and is the highest scorer in the tournament so far with 423 runs in 10 matches at a strike rate of 151.61.

This is by far Rayudu’s best batting display in the IPL, a tournament he has been playing non-stop since 2010. His average of 42.30 and tally of 39 fours and 22 sixes and the highest score of 82 are also the best ever registered in this format. Rayudu has certainly grown as a performer in the IPL – a sign of a great player.

Suryakumar Yadav has transformed as a batsman this IPL

MI’s Suryakumar Yadav doesn’t look an IPL batsman and his performances in the five editions that he played since 2012 (he wasn’t there in 2013) was never extraordinary. But the 2018 edition is proving to be a game-changer moment of his career as he has already amassed 399 runs in 10 matches to rank second in the list of scorers, second only to CSK’s Ambati Rayudu.

The 27-year-old batsman from Mumbai perhaps is finding his home-based franchise more suitable to play for than KKR who he represented last. Yadav has been assigned the role of opening the innings for MI this season and he is doing it with style, having already scored four half-centuries in 10 games (he had only one in all the five seasons he played earlier). His strike rate of 132.11 is though not the best he has exhibited in the IPL but his capacity to clear the ropes has been asserted more effectively this year (45 fours; 12 sixes). Yadav is also known to be an inconsistent performer in the domestic circuit after a good start but his batting performance in the 2018 edition could make a better customer with the bat in the career ahead. Afterall, IPL is known to give finishing touches to players.