IPL 2019: 3 potential replacements of Kane Williamson if he's ruled out of the tournament

Everybody was sure that Kane Williamson wasn’t going to play the whole season last time around. In fact, he was expected to get only a handful of games. It was not until disaster struck Australia’s David Warner and Steve Smith which led to CA imposing a year-long ban on them. Eventually, BCCI too banned them from playing the last edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL). Kane was then handed over the responsibility of leading the 2016 title winners and mind you, the expectations were quite high as David Warner was a fantastic skipper for the Hyderabad-based outfit.

It wasn’t only about the captaincy, but also about David’s consistency for his side. Some might say that it was quite unfair on KW to have such massive expectations from him in his first full-season but boy, did he deliver. Not only did he finish the season with the Orange Cap, but he also made sure that SRH topped the group and made it to the finals. Unfortunately for the Sunrisers Hyderabad and Williamson, they ended on the losing side but nonetheless, he has established himself as a key component of SRH.

Recently, in the second test against Bangladesh, the 28-year-old sustained a rare grade 1 Pectoral Minor tear and with the World Cup approaching, one might just see the New Zealand Cricket board taking precautionary measures to ensure that their skipper is in good shape before the mega-event.

On the other hand, there is every chance of the injury aggravating and in that case, he would be ruled out of the cash-rich tournament. While this would be a huge blow to SRH, let’s have a look at the three possible replacements for the NZ skipper if he does skip the IPL due to any of the two reasons mentioned above.

Brendon McCullum

The former New Zealand skipper announced his retirement from international cricket back in 2015 and since then, he has been an active participant in T20 leagues around the globe. B’Mac had a forgetful 2018 season with RCB as he could manage only 127 runs in the 6 matches that he played. However, this year’s BBL was a complete turnaround for the 37-year-old as he managed to finish his BBL career on a high with 385 runs to his name at the end of the 14 games that he featured in.

Even though age is not on his side, B’Mac is still one of the fittest and the most agile players going around at the moment. If not with the bat, he will be sure to contribute in the field because he has the habit of plucking catches out of nowhere and making some insane stops which adds a whole new dimension to the side that he’s playing for.
What is your say on a Kiwi replacing another Kiwi?