Indian Premier League: MS Dhoni and Mayank Yadav star in an IPL run-scoring storm | Cricket News

Sky Sports’ Matt Kabir Floyd gives a team-by-team preview of the 2024 Indian Premier League, which starts on Friday live on Sky Sports, along with his starting XI, the names to look out for and who he thinks will win the title this year…

Every once in a while, a T20 match creates the perfect storm – a pitch as flat as the M1, batters seeing the ball like a football and bowlers who can’t nail a yorker for toffee.

That match in this season’s IPL was Sunrisers Hyderabad’s record-busting win against Mumbai Indians last week. But that storm almost broke again on Wednesday… and this time it was Kolkata Knight Riders’ batters who whipped it up by savaging Delhi Capitals’ bowling attack and – it seems incredible to say it – they will actually feel they missed a big opportunity to break Sunrisers’ newly-set record for the highest-ever IPL total.

With seven balls left, and Andre Russell and Rinku Singh teeing off to all parts, 14 more was needed, but they were both gone within two deliveries and the Knight Riders had to ultimately settle for a score of 272, five runs short of the record.

If we see another storm like that developing, it might be a good idea for all bowlers to return indoors immediately.

KKR have made a stunning start to the tournament, blowing teams away with an ultra-aggressive batting unit. It’s been great to see ‘Dre Russ’ and Sunil Narine roll back the years. Russell has been with Kolkata since 2014, Narine since 2012, and you can see and feel the bond they have developed with the city, just like Kieron Pollard has done with Mumbai. The Knight Riders look like they are getting back to being the excitement machine they were of the previous decade and the IPL is much better for it.

India unearth future fast-bowling gem in Mayank

Now I may have painted a very bleak picture for bowlers in the tournament so far but there is a ray of light amid the darkness. It comes in the form of Lucknow Super Giants’ uncapped 21-year-old fast bowler Mayank Yadav. And when I say fast, I mean real fast… 97.4 miles per hour fast!

To put that in context, only Shaun Tait, Lockie Ferguson and Umran Malik have ever bowled faster deliveries in IPL history. Two matches into his IPL career and he’s already ripping through international batsmen, with two Player-Of-The-Match awards pocketed in his cricket bag.

Nothing excites like genuine pace and there is a strong argument to say that India has the two fastest bowlers in the world right now in Mayank and Malik. Long gone are the days when there was a real dearth of fast bowlers in the country and Indian fans were forced to look enviously north to Pakistan’s seemingly endless production line of quicks. These days, India lead the way.

MS Dhoni-watch continues and while he’s been happy to take a back seat with his batting, the one glimpse of him so far has been utterly thrilling. I have never seen a crowd react to a brief innings at the end of a match in the way the Visakhapatnam crowd did when the Chennai Super Kings lost to the Capitals.

The match was gone – Chennai couldn’t win – but the entire stadium (including Delhi fans) got swept up in a wave of delirious noise as Dhoni spanked a 16-ball 37 in the final three overs. At that moment, the result seemed almost irrelevant – the crowd had got what they had come for, and that was Dhoni.

England look to fill Stokes-sized hole at T20 World Cup

The big news for England over the last few days is that Ben Stokes will not be at the T20 World Cup in June as he continues to focus on building up his bowling fitness in time for the Test summer a month later.

It’s obviously a big blow because of his all-round qualities and it creates a big problem for England’s batting lineup. Jos Buttler, Phil Salt, Will Jacks, Jonny Bairstow, Harry Brook, and Liam Livingstone are the top contenders for the top six but they are all right-handers. A left-hander would make a big difference as, otherwise, opponents will pack their bowling attacks with leg-spinners and left-arm spinners.

Dawid Malan seems to have been cast aside and Moeen Ali can’t get into the Chennai team at the moment. Could this open up an opportunity for Sam Curran? His batting looks to have gone up a level, to the point where he could regularly be pushed up the order, as he has been at times in his IPL career. If his bowling can get back to where it once was, he might prove to be the solution to filling England’s Stokes-sized hole.

As ever, the duration of matches has been a hot topic in this year’s IPL. T20 matches seem to be getting longer and longer and the idea of using the Smart Review system is an attempt to speed things up. Essentially – like VAR in football – the TV umpire is now in a truck with the hawkeye operators so there is no need for the TV director to be involved, which should help quicken up the process.

I’m a fan of the idea – even if one or two decisions may not have been correct, in my opinion – and I can see it being used in other tournaments and international cricket.

One thing I would change is the ridiculous decision to allow captains to review wides. I don’t understand why you would speed up the game with Smart Reviews and then slow it down again by allowing more decisions to be reviewed?

As my old mate Bumble would say, ‘Get on with the game!’

Watch continued coverage of the 2024 Indian Premier League, live on Sky Sports Cricket. Non-Sky subscribers can stream the action with a NOW Sports Day or Month Membership.

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