IPL 2020: Flop XI of the first two weeks

9. Shreyas Gopal (RR)

RR’s approach of taking quick wickets upfront enables them to feature two wrist-spinners in their playing XI. But that approach comes with the risk of going for a few runs too many. Case in point: Shreyas Gopal’s trajectory for this season. 

Steve Smith has tried to be prudent in utilising his spinners, preferring not to bowl them in the powerplay unless absolutely necessary. This season, Gopal has usually come into bowl the 7th over which have given him the luxury of having some extra fielders at the boundary.

Having said that, that advantage becomes moot when playing on small grounds like Sharjah and Dubai where batsmen have a much better time at hitting boundaries. Gopal learned that the hard way against CSK, KXIP and KKR, going above 9 runs per over in each of those games. 

His wicket-taking abilities too, have been on a slight wane; across his four outings, he has only 2 dismissals to his name. Rajasthan would certainly expect much better from their first-choice spinner in their upcoming matches.