Yash Thakur does in the IPL what he's been doing in domestic cricket all along

May 16, 2023, Lucknow. It is a proper IPL four-pointer between the Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) and the Mumbai Indians (MI). LSG have posted 177 on a tricky surface, although that does not seem enough when Ishan Kishan and Rohit Sharma start teeing off for the five-time IPL champions.

In quick succession, both are dismissed and suddenly, LSG seem to have a sniff in the game. The required run rate, which was lesser than nine runs per over at the halfway stage, is starting to nudge closer to 10. After 14 overs, MI are 115-2 and have two relatively new batters at the crease.

One of those, though, is Suryakumar Yadav, and as long as he is out there, MI are favorites. Yash Thakur is handed the ball. The youngster has bowled two overs previously and has conceded 22 runs without picking up a wicket.

There are also murmurs that he was perhaps not the right Impact Player LSG brought in, especially on a track that had turned in the first innings. Yash does not let all of this bother him. With MI needing 63 off six overs, the game, if he allows it to, can drift away. But if he wants it, he can break it open for his side.

Those who have only watched him in the IPL feel that the pacer, because of his inexperience, will crumble. Those that have watched him in domestic cricket, however, know that he has a trick or two up his sleeve. At least.

And after just one ball in the 15th over, the latter rings true.

Yash bowls the ball on a length, and it is just the sort of delivery that Suryakumar usually scoops for fun. This one, though, is a tad slower, meaning that he is early into his stroke and ends up hitting it straight into the off stump.

It is not the kind of dismissal you would usually associate with Suryakumar, for he is so good on this stroke. But tonight, it has come about because a youngster was brave enough to hang the ball outside off and outwit Suryakumar playing the stroke he most loves.

But that is not all that Yash does on the night. When MI require 39 off three overs, he is entrusted with responsibility again. This time, his over does not begin with a wicket. In fact, he bowls a wide and a no ball before he eventually gets the better of Vishnu Vinod.

Yash Thakur has held his nerve under pressure in the IPL

What that over did portray, though, is that Yash, despite finding himself in the cauldron of pressure that the IPL is, had enough conviction to keep attempting yorkers. He was, at different stages in that over, bowling to Tim David, considered one of the most fearsome hitters in the IPL.

Yet, he kept nailing those yorkers as he does in domestic cricket. And that is why this display was special. Yes, he ended up conceding 40 runs in four overs, and in an IPL game where his team scored only 177, that was slightly more than the number of runs LSG would have wanted him to ship.

But he also bowled two excellent wicket-taking overs that had a massive say in where the game ended up.

In domestic cricket, he bowls these tough overs on a regular basis for Vidarbha. In all T20 games where ball-by-ball data is available, he has conceded 7.72 runs per over at the death. He has bowled 139 balls in this phase too, which is a decent enough sample space.

In the most recent edition of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, he was Vidarbha’s leading wicket-taker and the tournament’s sixth-highest. Those 15 scalps came at an economy rate of 7.17, an average under 16, and a strike rate of just more than 13.

Throughout his T20 career, which spans 44 matches, he has picked up 63 wickets at an economy rate of 7.08 – at an average of 16.12 and a strike rate of 13.6.

So, what he did in Lucknow against the mighty five-time IPL winners, is not a flash in the pan. It was, in many ways, the sort of display those in the domestic know-how always thought he would be able to replicate. Now, in addition to those perceptions, he has tangible evidence to back it up.

In fact, this IPL season, he already has eight wickets in seven matches and has often bowled at the death for LSG – like he did on Tuesday. That LSG thought he was more suited to come in as an Impact Player, ahead of established IPL spinners like Amit Mishra and Krishnappa Gowtham should tell you that his franchise trusts him too.

The IPL, it is often said, makes or breaks cricketers. Based on what thousands of fans witnessed on Tuesday, with respect to Yash, you cannot help but believe that the former will ring true.