The jury was divided when KKR broke the bank to acquire Mitchell Starc in IPL 2024 auction. It would be Mitchell Starc‘s first franchise or domestic T20 appearance since he last represented RCB in 2015. In the interim Mitchell Starc featured only in T20 Internationals, mostly in World Cups, that were played in largely bowler friendly conditions in UAE in 2021 and early season wickets back home in 2022. IPL is a different beast in itself, and the addition of Impact Player has made it distance further from the rest of the pack.
Mitchell Starc’s modus operandi is well laid out: bowl it full and fast and get it swerve in the air – be it the conventional swing with the new ball or reverse with the old. The ball swings – if at all – for a very small window and if one misses his length, the ball could travel afar.
This is a high variance method where if he gets it right he will significantly dent the opponent up top but when he gets things wrong it could go awry for his side. It was evident in how his season with KKR went: he picked up 12 wickets in 11 league games and conceded at 11.37/over but in the two Playoffs games he blew the SRH top order away picking up 5/38 in seven overs across two games, all five coming in the Powerplay.
Sunrisers Hyderabad’s philosophy of living by the sword and dying by it led them to their second successive defeat, against Delhi Capitals in Vizag. Mitchell Starc picked his maiden T20 fifer to keep SRH down to 163 despite Aniket Verma’s six-hitting exhibition in a 41-ball 74 before the DC top-order chased it down with 7 wickets and four overs to spare.
Pitch Report and Toss
Pitch Report : The sun is out. Dimensions – 66m and 60 square boundaries, downtown – 73m. This surface has got an interesting composition – it has got one and half inches of black soil at the top on a foundation of red soil beneath it. This pitch is hard and this venue is usually a delight for the batter.
We saw the Delhi side chase 209 the other night. The last time a game was played on this surface, 272 runs were score. We can expect the batters to have a field day. But, as far as the spinners are concerned, they might get some assistance later on because the sun is beating down on the surface and breaking it. reckons Danny Morrison and WV Raman
Toss : Sunrisers Hyderabad skipper Pat Cummins won the toss and chose to bat with one change in the Playing XI bringing in debutant spinner Zeeshan Ansari for Simarjeet Singh. Delhi Capitals skipper Axar Patel who also wanted to bat first made one change in the Playing XI welcoming newly became father KL Rahul for Sameer Rizvi.
Mitchell Starc’s career best 5-fer and Kuldeep Yadav’s 3-fer restricts SRH to 163 despite Aniket Verma’s heroic 74 runs.
Pat Cummins became the first captain this season to bat first after winning the toss but his high-flying top-order was quickly dismantled by Mitchell Starc. Abhishek Sharma was run out after a mix-up between the openers after which Mitchell Starc took out Ishan Kishan, Nitish Reddy and Travis Head by the fifth over. With that, since IPL 2024, Mitchell Starc has 8 wickets in 11 overs against SRH in PowerPlay. SRH should’ve been five down before the end of the PowerPlay, but Abhishek Porel put down a catch to offer Aniket Verma a reprieve.
Like he did in last year’s IPL final, Mitchell Starc proved menacing, but he was aided along the way. Abhishek Sharma ran himself out in the first over, Ishan Kishan slashed to deep third, and local boy Nitish Reddy heaved a slow off cutter to mid-on.
Head vs Mitchell Starc was brewing to be a contest within a contest. Head began by hitting him for two back-to-back fours, but after the flurry of wickets, Axar Patel’s decision to persist with Mitchell Starc for a third over paid off when Head’s attempted ramp against him found KL Rahul’s gloves. SRH were 37 for 4 in the fifth over.
Aniket, 23, was all of three T20s old coming into this game. But he showed why SRH have so much faith in him. His incredible 41-ball 74 formed the bedrock of the SRH innings. He hit five fours and six sixes in his innings, twinning with Heinrich Klaasen during a 77-run stand off just 40 balls to lift the team after the Starc menace.
Aniket shouldn’t have lasted that long, though. In the fourth over, he survived a run-out chance when Tristan Stubbs missed a direct hit at the striker’s end. In the sixth, his leading edge off Axar was put down by Abhishek Porel circling from extra cover.
Aniket made them pay – well, almost – by hitting Axar for back-to-back sixes in his next over. Klaasen, whose first six was a whip off Starc, wasn’t too far behind, but when he was out to Mohit Sharma after being brilliantly caught by Vipraj Nigam running back from point, SRH needed a semblance of stability at 114 for 5 in the 11th over.
Aniket flexed his muscles against DC’s spinners, starting out by hitting Vipraj Nigam for a six and a four in the seventh over. In the next over, he tonked Axar for two successive sixes and also went after Mohit Sharma. Heinrich Klaasen then welcomed Kuldeep Yadav with a straight six to press on with the fifth-wicket stand.
They took the team past 100 by the halfway stage but DC hit back through an excellent catch from Vipraj Nigam that sent the South African back. Kuldeep and Axar then bowled three excellent overs, conceding just eight in it. Aniket meanwhile got to his maiden IPL half-century and went after Axar once again in a 17-run 15th over. Aniket departed in the 16th over chasing another big six, falling for a 41-ball 74.
SRH’s lower order was put to the test, and they were undone by DC’s spinners. Kuldeep had Abhinav Manohar slicing one to long-off and Cummins holing out to the lone man at deep midwicket. Aniket then decided to take control, hitting Axar for 4, 6, 6 to start the 16th over. Fraser-McGurk and Axar’s athleticism – at deep midwicket and mid-off, respectively – then helped close out the innings as SRH left eight deliveries unused.
Mitchell Starc then came back to quickly wrap the innings up in the 19th over, dismissing Harshal Patel and Wiaan Mulder. While SRH finished on 163, the Aussie quick Mitchell Starc walked away with figures of 5-35, his first fifer in T20 cricket.
40 year old Faf Du Plessis yet another IPL half century powers DC to 7 wicket win over SRH despite dazzling debut by Zeeshan Ansari.
Faf du Plessis and Jake Fraser-McGurk started well, taking on all four of the bowling options that Cummins threw at them in the PowerPlay. Harshal Patel bowled a good first over but Cummins himself was taken apart for 13 runs. Shami started well but erred in his second to let DC control the game at the start of their chase.
Fraser-McGurk’s powerplay salvo set the tempo for DC last year, but he struggled for rhythm for large parts tonight. This was offset by du Plessis’ fluency as he raced to a 26-ball half-century during the course of an 81-run opening stand. Du Plessis took a liking to Abhishek early on, and was equally brutal when Pat Cummins erred in length.
SRH’s young leggie Zeeshan Ansari picked three wickets but it didn’t alter the course of the proceedings as the hosts galloped along towards the target through different batters. Du Plessis got to a 26-ball half-century while McGurk too showed urgency before falling to the spinner. DC had 96 on the board at the halfway stage, being comfortably ahead of the asking rate.
Ansari, 25, last played a T20 in 2019. But he got a second wind when he ended up as the highest wicket-taker in the latest UP T20 League. On Sunday, he began with a series of half-trackers but settled in to have du Plessis miscue to long-on and Fraser-McGurk chip one back on either side of a sequence of 4, 6, 6.
In his first innings for DC, Rahul thrilled briefly when he got stuck into Mohammed Shami, muscling him over deep midwicket for a six and then launching him up and over the infield for a four. Rahul became Ansari’s third wicket when he was bowled around his legs. Porel and Stubbs put together 51 off just 28 balls to see DC home without further alarm.
KL Rahul marked his DC debut by smashing Shami for two fours and a six in the 11th over. Abhishek Porel then walked out and seamlessly carried on with the run-making, hitting Ansari for a four and a six in the 14th over. DC got to 150/3 in 15 overs, with only 13 more to get at the death. Porel went after Wiaan Mulder in the 16th over to complete the commanding victory.
SRH were hamstrung in the PowerPlay with four dismissals. They got six more than Delhi Capitals did in this phase but it was the repercussions of this phase that led them to an under-par total.
Presentations and Road Ahead
Pat Cummins the losing SRH skipper said : We didn’t get going, didn’t get a score on the board. A few wrong shots, but catches in the deep does happen in this format of the game. I don’t think it’s a big margin, on another day, you get going with a couple of shots, not everything went our way in the last two games, we can look back and think about different options.
Coming into the tournament, everyone was super impressed with him going into the lead-up to the tournament (on Aniket Verma), was fantastic and gave us half a chance, was impressive with the way he went about things (during the net sessions and practice games). It’s too early to worry about being two down, hopefully we’ll get back going forward, as I said, we need to have a look at a few of our options.
Axar Patel the winning DC skipper said : I have told before that I am going to lead the side in the same manner. You need to be up with your game. You can’t take any game easily, there are 10 good teams playing. We need to focus on our plans and process. Today we were successful in doing so. Plan was to give Starc two overs at the start and two overs at the end, but he was in good rhythm.
Hence, I gave him the third over and he was able to pick an important wicket. We have experienced players in the team, they give me suggestions. Sometimes I follow them. Enjoying playing with these players. We are playing at Kotla since many years, we’ll have similar plans. Need to assess the conditions after going there.
Mitchell Starc Player of the match for his 5-fer said : It has been a good day. With the ball, in the field and with the bat. It was a fantastic performance by us today. There’s no ego in bowlers these days. As a bowler you got to think out of the box. You need to do things you wouldn’t normally do. It was nice to contribute in the win today, we move forward from here. Guys know what I am going to do, so you need to think out of the box.
As an older player you need to find different ways to get batters out. Tried to bowl different balls today, was pretty effective I think. It’s a new set of players, they have been fantastic. You get to play with new guys, it’s a great group of players. It’s a pretty young group to be fair, looking forward to playing more with them.
Mitchell Starc’s T20 best powered Delhi Capitals (DC) to a second straight win in Vizag as Sunrisers Hyderabad’s (SRH) all-out approach backfired for the second time in two games. Faf du Plessis then set the tempo for the chase with a half-century and despite Zeeshan Ansari’s three quick wickets on his T20 return after six years, DC’s strong 81-run opening stand set up an easy win in 16 overs with seven wickets in hand.
Mitchell Starc of Australia achieved a historic feat in the IPL on March 30th. Bowling for the Delhi Capitals against Sunrisers Hyderabad, he became the first pace bowler to take a five-wicket haul in the league. His impressive performance in Visakhapatnam yielded figures of 5 for 35 in just 3.4 overs. In the third over’s first ball, the bowler claimed his first wicket, dismissing Ishan Kishan (2) caught by Tristan Stubbs. Two balls later, he bowled Nitish Kumar Reddy for a golden duck, caught by Delhi Capitals captain Axar Patel.
Mitchell Starc achieved his first five-wicket haul in T20 cricket on Sunday. This feat, including his fourth wicket of the match, also propelled him past 200 T20 wickets; he now has 201 wickets from 144 matches. This meant Aniket Verma’s blazing 41-ball 74, highlighted by his takedown of Axar Patel and Kuldeep Yadav, was overshadowed as SRH slumped to their second straight loss.
Two in two for Delhi Capitals. They pulled off a spectacular run chase against the Lucknow Super Giants as Ashutosh Sharma played a blinder, but today it was a complete and a lot more clinical performance by the entire DC unit. Mitchell Starc’s excellent spell helped them restrict a powerhouse like that of SRH for a mediocre total and their batters have done a professional job in completing the run chase on a good batting surface.
Although Jake Fraser-McGurk struggled initially, Faf du Plessis’ flawless knock helped him from the other end. The experienced South African batsman also notched up a solid fifty before he was dismissed by debutant – Zeeshan Ansari. Jake Fraser-McGurk departed soon, while Rahul played a brief cameo before getting bowled by Ansari. Stubbs and Porel made sure there were no further hiccups, as the Capitals got over the line in the 16th over.
So after posting a massive total of 286/6 in their first match of the season against Rajasthan Royals, Sunrisers Hyderabad have tumbled and posted a couple of mediocre totals according to their standards. In their quest to breach the 300-run mark, the Sunrisers have lost their way in back-to-back games.
Also teams are finding ways to counter SRH’s aggressive batting approach and have found success while doing so. Barring Aniket Verma, most of their batters couldn’t get going today. Will the runners-up of the last season manage to bounce back and get back to winning ways in days to come, or will their campaign derail further. Sunrisers head to Kolkata where they face KKR on April 3 while Delhi Capitals have a longer break before taking on CSK in Chennai on April 5.