IPL Talking Points: End of commercial season awaits as Hardik Pandya’s return to Mumbai Indians doesn’t work out | Cricket News

Matt Kabir Floyd reflects on the business end of the IPL season as Hardik Pandya’s move to Mumbai Indians from Gujarat Titans doesn’t work out for all parties.

And so, after a grueling few weeks, we reached the business end of the IPL. It’s not good to come out of the blocks in this tournament only to get passed in the last lap. The T20 may be the shortest international format by far, but the IPL is very much a marathon, not a sprint.

Mumbai and Punjab never really seemed to hold on and Gujarat pulled away after putting themselves in a decent position to challenge for the top four.

This was a team that had reached the final in each of its first two years of existence and was starting to look like it might be on the right track to creating the next great IPL dynasty. But Hardik Pandya’s decision to return to Mumbai seemed to lessen the aura around the Titans.

Not only did they miss his inspiring leadership, but also his racing. Oddly, Hardik’s captaincy seemed to weaken the Indians and he even ended up getting booed by some of his own fans, which is almost unheard of in India. Rarely has a move worked so badly for both teams involved!

Gujarat may have fallen, but Rajasthan is the specialist in collapse. At least this year they had enough wins in the bank to qualify for the play-offs, but their four-game losing streak doesn’t exactly inspire confidence heading into the knockout stages.

This has happened several times during the IPL seasons and it cannot be due to chance. Lack of depth must be a major factor – while the Royals’ first XI looks extremely strong, there is a sharp drop in quality when it comes to replacements. I hope I’m wrong, but I’ll be surprised if they turn things around and make it to the finale.

The Sunrisers, on the other hand, seem to have found their mojo again. A slight swing of three defeats from four raised some concerns, but the destruction of the Super Giants by Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma sent another frightening message to the rest of the tournament.

I think they could even finish top two ahead of Royals, who are set to face top-ranked Kolkata in their final group match. If they do, this first qualifier between the Knight Riders and the Sunrisers will certainly be a blockbuster with races, races and more races!

Delhi and Lucknow’s negative net run rate means you can rule them out of the play-offs, which leaves us with the Royal Challengers and Super Kings. And guess what? They face each other on Saturday. It will indeed be the winner at Chinnaswamy, a stadium with arguably the best atmosphere in the competition, it is not a stadium not to be missed.

IPL says goodbye to England players in T20 World Cup

Sadly, it’s a farewell to England’s T20 World Cup players who are done and dusted at the IPL. It was a fun old tournament for them.

Lots of lows but also massive highs, namely four centuries scored by English players, a record never achieved in a season.

Jos Buttler, Jonny Bairstow and Will Jacks showed that on their day they were as destructive as any hitter in the world, while Phil Salt was the most consistent of the lot.

Sam Curran continued his full rehabilitation, Moeen Ali was underutilized and Liam Livingstone disappointed before picking up an injury.

Spare a thought for Reece Topley, though: he had to play on one of the flattest terraces in the smallest stadium, in a year when hitters went wild like never before. Keep your head up Reece, I hope it’s a little easier for the bowlers at the World Cup!

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