The Pepsi Indian Premier League 2014 juggernaut rolls on and as the
second weekend of the season drew to a close, one was witness to plenty
of mind-blowing action. Here are some of the top picks from the week
that has gone by:
More Max from…Well…Maxwell
Glenn
Maxwell had blown away two formidable sides in the first five days of
the season. Chennai Super Kings – despite posting 205 on the board –
were demolished by the Australian who smashed 95 off 43 balls. The
Rajasthan Royals were at the receiving end next; playing a wide range of
shots, finding the unmanned regions on the field precisely and packing
some muscle in his strokes, Maxwell smashed six sixes and eight fours in
his 45-ball 89.
Maxwell’s first innings last week mirrored his
efforts against CSK. His 43-ball 95 versus SRH contained an incredible
nine sixes – including a 98 m hit, which set the record for the longest
six in the tournament at that point. The leg-side was undoubtedly his
preferred scoring area – he scored 74 percent of his runs on that side
of the pitch. There was a lot of rationale in Maxwell’s choice of shots;
he normally packed a punch in his sweeps and slog-sweeps, but he pulled
out the unorthodox reverse-sweep and switch-hit from his repertoire
when the bowlers packed the leg-side field and bowled a restrictive
line. And he picked the gaps playing those unorthodox shots too!
Incredible CatchesDropped
catches continued to cost teams during Week 2; some 16 catches were put
down in the 10 matches played in that period. However, there were some
screamers too.
Chennai Super Kings’ Faf du Plessis pulled off two
stunning catches in the space of one over in Chennai Super Kings’ match
against the Delhi Daredevils. The two catches he took – to send back
Murali Vijay and
Manoj Tiwary
– reflected on how complete an athlete he is. With the airborne cricket
ball flying away from him, du Plessis – stationed at mid-off – ran in
pursuit of it, covering a lot of ground. He kept looking upwards to keep
his eyes on the ball, and as the ball came crashing down, he lunged and
came up with the ball in both hands.
The second effort was even
better – he had to stretch completely at the last moment and had to be
airborne for a moment even as the ball made contact with his palms. Such
catches happen once in a while. But to pull it off twice in quick
succession is simply astounding.
Lynn’s Limbo near the FenceIf
one thought du Plessis had set the new standards for catching, there
was more to come in Week 2. Kolkata Knight Riders’ Chris Lynn pulled off
a screamer against Royal Challengers Bangalore. With RCB on the brink
of victory, AB de Villiers made good connection as he attempted to
deposit R Vinay Kumar into the stands at midwicket. Chris Lynn
positioned squarer on the leg-side boundary, ran to his left in an
attempt to take the catch.
Just as he appeared to get to the
position where the ball was coming down, he slipped – right on the edge
of the fence – almost as if he was doing the limbo. The Australian was
not one bit distracted despite losing his footing. He held his poise,
settled down nicely under the ball, with his knees firmly on the ground.
And as the ball came down, he raised himself ever so slightly, and
then, arched backwards to come up with the ball.
What was more
astonishing was the follow-up. The 24-year-old lost his balance during
the act of arching backwards to get enough elevation to come in contact
with the ball. However, he showed good awareness as he realized the
momentum would have resulted in his head landing on the padding of the
boundary rope. He dragged his body forward just enough to ensure he
landed inside the field of play with the ball in his hand. Unreal!
Ump VisionOne
of the innovations of Pepsi IPL 2014 has been wiring the on-field
Umpires with cameras and getting to see bits of action from their
perspective. And one got to see two fantastic visuals from the Umpire’s
Cam during Week 2. First up, in RCB’s match against KKR, the camera
mounted on Umpire Vineet Kulkarni’s hat provided visuals of Yuvraj Singh
muscling Umesh Yadav for a six over midwicket. The camera gave an
insight into the pace of things in the middle – the speed at which the
ball travels to the batsman, the time the batsman has to react and play
the shot, how well Yuvraj Singh middled it on that occasion, and finally
how far he hit it.
There was another piece of brilliance
captured by the Umpire’s Cam in the match between the Mumbai Indians and
Delhi Daredevils. DD opener Quinton de Kock pounced on a wide delivery
from Corey Anderson and cut it right out of the middle of the bat. But
38-year-old Michael Hussey, positioned at point, moved swiftly to his
left and pulled off a sharp catch right in front of the Umpire at the
striker’s end. The Umpire’s Cam gave us a good look into the positioning
of the point fielder, how quickly the ball traveled to him and how
agile Hussey was to move swiftly to his left and pluck a sharp catch.
This is as close as one can get to all the action in the centre!
Selection of the Week ‘Why
fix things when they ain’t broke?’ they say. But Kolkata Knight Riders
skipper Gautam Gambhir made the huge decision of leaving out R Vinay
Kumar, who had bowled the fantastic last over – successfully defending
nine runs – in KKR’s previous match against Royal Challengers Bangalore.
Speaking at the toss, Gambhir explained his team was going with “horses
for courses” and had hence picked leg-spinner Piyush Chawla for their
match against Kings XI Punjab. And didn’t the move work! The 25-year-old
spinner returned as the most successful bowler for KKR with figures of
4-0-19-3. Who were his three scalps? The dangerous David Miller, George
Bailey and Virender Sehwag!