IPL 2025: Weeks 2 and 3 - Are we back to 2009?

[00:00:08] Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Edges & Sledges Cricket Podcast. I'm your host Ashwin, I'm joined by DJ. On the back of, I see you're wearing a shirt that says what I think is historic or historic. And what I think is that the moment we're recording this, Delhi Capitals has just gone through what I would think of as a historic bottling of a taste that they had made simple. But obviously we're going to talk about a lot more than that.

[00:00:37] But DJ, how are you doing man? How's IPL season good? We're in the middle overs now. This is kind of that phase where it's hard to keep momentum sometimes. I think 30 odd games are done now if I'm not mistaken. We just played the 29th and there are 70 group games. So this is the phase where momentum starts to slip a little in our IPL fandom. How are you doing? How are you holding up? I'm well man. I just wanted to point out before we got into the thick of it, there was only one guy that said that DC would make the playoffs, right?

[00:01:06] One guy on the podcast. Probably one guy in all of India that was saying that DC would make the playoffs. To be very fair, on the back of what I thought about 20 minutes ago, I'm not changing my predictions. Yeah, but this was classic DC back. So after a long time, like I said, I'm going to sit down on a Sunday, watch most of the game. Delhi was in Mumbai. Mumbai, I think they were ninth on the table.

[00:01:31] Delhi were top of the table, shockingly going into this game. And it was, as you said, a historic bottling. Just epic proportions, absolutely. But it's historic in the sense that we've seen it before because the history repeating itself. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've seen it so many times, the same thing. This time it was just pantless. It was just like with somebody else. Dan Delhi felt pantless in the moment.

[00:01:58] Yeah, listen, the episode title we put out there, which is a little bit controversial. But are we back in 2009? It is the 18th year of the IPL, DJ. 2025. And yet we're kind of looking at this and saying, Emma Stone is back as captain of CSK. Ajinkya Rahane is captain and playing an important role for his side. And R.P. Singh was showing up on the TV. Karan Sharma has come back in.

[00:02:27] I mean, that took the three wickets and just did well. Like, there are elements of this that just feel like, and oh, by the way, KKR is still reliant on Narayan and Russell. And anyway, it just feels like we've taken a little bit of a trip back in time. Is that how you'd summarize a little bit of what we've seen in the last, call it, week or two of IPL cricket? Yeah, two more things. Delhi was top of the table back in 2009. In that Daredevil's Avatar.

[00:02:54] This would have been Sawag, Warner, AB, Dilshan, McGrath. Oh, what a time that was. Yeah, and Karan Nair, blast from the past, man. He played a cracking knock. Like, just took people apart, had a bit of a spat with Jaspreet Bumrah, man. So good. So it's, yeah, what a time to be alive. We will talk a little bit more about Karan Nair.

[00:03:22] But, man, it's been such an interesting IPL season. So let's talk quickly about the points table as it stands. And I was very ready to have a very different tone of a conversation as a Delhi fan, being the only undefeated team. Going into, I mean, how did you describe it? I think Delhi lost, they lost this game to Mumbai with a Karan Sharma three-wicket haul and a hat-trick in a Bumrah over. But Bumrah took none of those wickets.

[00:03:52] Well, not a hat-trick. A hat-trick that started in the Bumrah. I mean, just absolutely wild. But DJ is sitting here. Gujarat, Delhi, Bangalore, and Lucknow, all at eight points at the top. Very different to what most people would have thought. And then still, even despite the win, Chennai, Hyderabad, Rajasthan, Mumbai are the bottom four. Actually, that might have been my four picks for the playoffs. I think I'm pretty sure I said Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai. I may have picked KKR as the fourth.

[00:04:22] But anyway, I'm surprised. On the one hand, you're looking at this and saying Mumbai always starts slow. They're starting to pick up some steam. CSK has looked weak on paper and losing Ruta Raj, which would come back and talk about MSD the phenomenon. But are you surprised by this as a whole? And Hyderabad is now picking up form. Travis Sheik is back. There's so much to think through. But are you surprised by the point table at the 29 game mark? I mean, I think pretty much everyone is, right?

[00:04:49] Because as you said, I think those were our top... I think most of us had three common picks, which were Hyderabad. I would put them right on top. Yeah. With a solid team. Just not done what they need to do. Followed by Mumbai. I mean, you've got people like Tilak. I mean, we'll talk about it. But Tilak was retired. Like, that was a weird move. And he's been good after that. And CSK.

[00:05:18] Like Chennai, I think we were just saying that they'd make it through. And I'd pick DC at my fourth team just for fun. Yeah. They're the only ones that have any... So what it teaches you, nobody knows anything but the IPR. Nobody really sees what the form is. It's all like... It's all a bonkers, like extravaganza of cricket. You can't tell. Actually, I'll use this to do a quick plug of a podcast that a lot of people, a lot of you listeners and stuff as well have been sharing with me. It's a show called Acquired, where they do these long-term business series. Did you get it? Did you listen to it? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:05:47] I've listened to it because it's the only league that they've talked about. They usually talk about companies, right? Yeah. They talk about Starbucks and stuff like that. Which IPL is, right? It's a business. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, it's an interesting lesson. And they talk about how the IPL is relatively equalized by virtue of how the league is structured, salary caps, auction process, this and that. So it is not unusual that a third of the league in, there's no undefeated teams anymore. There's no team that is yet to win anymore, which in most leagues happens.

[00:06:17] You have these crazy disparities between like a Manchester City and Brentford or somebody, if you're an English Premier League fan. Or in the NFL, there's parallels. And there's not quite that in the IPL. And that's what's made it so much fun. Now, you do have skippers and coaches who know how to lead their teams to trophies and others who haven't been able to. But anyway, these are a lot to uncover, right? RCB in third place on the points table. Brad Coley made a 50 earlier today.

[00:06:47] Phil Salt, by the way, also starting to look really good. So without getting into too many details, let's talk about a couple of things that have happened recently. Okay? So yesterday, at the time of recording this, Sunrise of Hyderabad played against Shreyas Ayer's Punjab team. Okay? I'm going to run through very quickly the scorecard, or not the whole scorecard, but the Punjab team batted first and made 245.

[00:07:15] Let's start with this new avatar of Shreyas Ayer. Some are calling him 2.0, 3.0, whatever it is. 82 runs of 36 balls. I think he's pretty high up there on the... He's number four on the Orange Cap list right now. 250 runs this season. I mean, I didn't even check the Fantasy League because he was a sure shot. Big for everybody now. And yes, he was the KKR trophy-lifting captain, but also he got released by them. He doesn't walk into the Indian side, especially not in this format.

[00:07:44] How brilliant has Shreyas been both as a skipper and as a batter this season? He's got a point to prove, right? Yeah. But he's also a trophy-winning guy. He's won like six trophies in the last 12 months or something. Crazy like that. So, no, he's batting well, man. Champions Trophy winner recently as well. Yeah. He's putting his hand up. He looks good and he's hitting it clean, right? And plus, I mean, he's got some pretty good batting conditions to be fair to him.

[00:08:14] No, absolutely. If you get 245, it means it's a belt of a pitch, right? And then what percent of the time as a captain who bats first, do you think you're winning a game with 245? Yeah. 99% of the time, I'd say. You think at 99.5% you actually win it. I think there's been one chase higher than that. It must be the Johnny Bester one. Even... When jump did it. Yes, that's probably right. Even the 1% where you think you might not win it, you think it may come down to the last ball. Eventually.

[00:08:44] Yeah, because Delhi will get run out like three... Yeah. Something stupid will happen. Something insane will happen. I'm not even talking... I just... I said there was a hat trick in a boomerang over and I glazed first what happened. But let's talk for a second about Abhishek Sharma. So, a lukewarm start to the season for Travis Sheik, Abhishek, whatever we're calling them. You know, and not a bad start. They had a couple of decent knocks. But my goodness, when they came out and made the Punjab bowling lineup, which by the way,

[00:09:13] Arshdeep Singh, Marco Janssen, Lockie Ferguson. I mean, not a bad bowling lineup on paper. And then of course, they ended up bowling. They played Yash Thakur, Maxwell bowled three overs, etc. But my goodness. Like, you've seen it before. And still, when Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma go ballistic, it is unlike anything else. I think in IPL or the world of cricket. I mean, Abhishek ended on 141 of 55 balls.

[00:09:42] A piece of paper came out when he made his century. His first century, by the way. So, think of how long he's had. In the IPL. First IPL. He's got 70-20 centuries otherwise. Like, this is a 70-20 century. I didn't realize that. He's got centuries for India and stuff. First, I knew he did for India, right? He was 7. So, it must be in other teams. It must be SMAT and stuff. Yeah. But, man. 141 in 55 balls. The highest individual score by an Indian player in the IPL's history.

[00:10:11] I mean, what do you even say about that? Are there words? Or is there any hyperbole they can describe? It was unbelievable. I mean, like, Travis Head. You call it Travis Head. But this was the Abhishek Sharma show with Travis Head watching, basically. I think Travis Head made like 65 of 30 or something like that. So, he was going at 200. But he looked so far. Yeah. It was like he was just watching the Abhishek Sharma show. And that was one shot, man. It was just before he got to his 100, I think. Where he played like a helicopter shot.

[00:10:41] And the ball just went miles. It went nearly outside the ground. And it was just the sound of the bat. You could hear it through the TV, man. Like, I can't even believe what it would have been like at the stadium. Of course, yes, again, a good pitch. He was dropped a couple of times. I think Stoyness dropped him once. Jail dropped him once. So, yeah. He had a bit of luck. But, man. He... To keep someone like... We've said this before.

[00:11:09] To keep someone like Jail Swal out of the Indian T20 side. And you have to be pretty special, right? Yeah. And this guy, he's just... I mean... He's where Ishan Kishan was like maybe four years ago. But on steroids. Yeah. Like that's where he is. And he doesn't stop. He just keeps going, going, going, going, going. It was just... Yeah. It was... You were left speechless at the end of that assault.

[00:11:37] And he had only made 50 runs in the first five innings he played, right? So, he wasn't coming off of great form or anything. 24-year-old. His parents were in the crowd, by the way. I don't know if you saw that as they were cutting to him. That was a nice moment. But, yeah. Just tremendous. Just absolutely tremendous. I mean, not a lot else you could say about that. DJ, let's pivot and quickly talk about the tie side that I thought would be table toppers. They're close. They're tied at eight points. But let's talk about the Delhi team. I don't...

[00:12:05] I wasn't actually planning to talk about this Mumbai game in too much detail. But we will very quickly. Where... Mumbai bats first. And... Sorry, I'm trying to pull up the scorecard as we talk. Mumbai bats first makes 100... Oh, it makes 205. And you're thinking that's a decent total. Yes, at Arun Jetli, anything is possible. Like, Sky was hitting them out of the park. Tilak found some more form. Namandhir hit a great knock at the end. Faf Duplassi is injured. Has come and gone. By the way, Jake Frazier-McGurk seems to be...

[00:12:34] Varun would call him the... He's going the direction of Prithvi Shah. Which is harsh to both of them somehow, I think. But... But with Faf out, you bring in a guy who is not only a test-match triple centurion for India, but he's had a phenomenal Sayed Mushta Kali trophy. I made 500 plus runs at a striker at 177. And Karun Nair comes in and just makes... This is a harsh sentence, but it makes Bumrah look like a gully cricketer a little bit. Just hitting it all around the park.

[00:13:04] There was equal balance of these glorious cover drives, just class and what made him a test cricketer. And then these hoiks where he was kind of almost falling over himself and the ball was still going for six. I mean, DJ, how often do we see this? That a guy sitting on the bench is just waiting for his opportunity. And then he gets one look in and now you're thinking, how earth was Delhi leaving this guy out of any game before, right? Thoughts on Karun? Yeah, I mean, unbelievable, right? What, 2017?

[00:13:35] Triple centurion? Yeah. So that's eight years ago. First ball, Jake goes, lobs a catch to Karun. First ball of the match, yeah. Of the innings. Oh, sorry, innings. And then Cheher bowls like a beauty. This first ball that Karun and I are setting up to play in the IPL after quite a long time. Bowls an absolute beauty. Nayat keeps it out. And then, man, it was just carnage. It was just great to watch.

[00:14:03] I mean, as you put it well, right? Like, Delhi is a great test match team. He's got some great tests. Not even better with Karun coming. With Karun's triple century coming. But look, he's bided his time, right? He's done whatever he needed to do. He's kind of got 800 runs in the domestic game. Went to the final of the Ranji Trophy. Scored runs in the SMAT. He scored runs in the Liste State tournament. It's... He's tried to... And this was his time.

[00:14:32] But obviously, like, if he'd got out first ball or second ball, it would have felt like he'd fluffed it on the big stage. Yeah. This was his time to get all those eyeballs in Indian cricket back looking at him. It's a little bit like what Sky did a few years ago when, like, he... Yeah. Made himself impossible to ignore, right? Yeah. And this... I'm not saying Karun is there. And I'm not even saying that for the T20 game. More like the test game.

[00:14:59] And the ODI is probably more suited to his style. But he made a statement today. It was a statement of intent. It was a statement, like, I'm here. I have played test cricket for India. And it's weird, like, that you're thinking of this guy in an ODI form when he just smacked, like, just Preet Bumar, one of the greatest bowlers alive in probably the history of the game. He smacked him around the ground. And had a little bit of a run-in with him as well, on the ground.

[00:15:29] You know what happened there? Like, I think he literally ran into him. Yeah. I think there was a little bit of a collision. But I didn't think it was anything too serious. Yeah. But then Bumar came to him and spoke to him later. Oh, I missed that. Okay. Yeah. So Nair got a bit animated. And then Pandey was like, just chill and all. By the way, speaking of run-ins on the ground, there was a great moment when Maxi was bowling in this head-to-shake chase against... Travis-shake. Yeah. Maxi was bowling and Travis-head got into it.

[00:15:58] And I couldn't initially tell if they were having fun or not, but it looked heated. And then Stylos comes in. But then Hulk turned up. He's like... And then you're just like, what is happening? These three Aussies who... I don't know. It was fascinating. Before we take a quick break, let's talk a little bit more about Delhi. Obviously, I'm biased, so that was higher up on my agenda. We will talk about a lot else. I'm talking about the game that happened right before this one. RCB makes 163. Nothing too crazy to write home about good bowling performance from Delhi to restrict them at the Chinnaswami.

[00:16:27] Despite that, chasing a small total, Faf gets out quickly. JFM gets out quickly, as he's done every game. And then Porel gets out quickly. And you're thinking, Delhi's 30 for three and 58 for four. KL Rahul batting at four for Delhi. Smacks 93 of 53. Wins a game that could have gone a very different direction with over two overs to spare. And then more importantly, stamps his bat into the ground. Pumps his kind of chest and celebrates saying this.

[00:16:55] And if you could read his lips correctly, he was saying, this is my house. And he's playing in Bangalore, right? He's a Karnataka kid. He's grown up playing there. His family's from there. His wife's family, obviously, Sudhil Chetty. And they're all Bangaloreans, Karnaticans, right? Like, on a ground where the ball was not coming on the bat. So much so that Kohli was struggling. All the other battles were struggling. He just batted like a dream. How good was that? And by the way, all these interviews are starting to surface where KL's now saying,

[00:17:22] I understand that D20 is about hitting boundaries. Which is like, thanks, Matt. It took you eight years to get there. But it's great to see him kind of back and understanding the role he wants to play and delivering on it, right? Yeah, absolutely. And I think the celebration is the Kanthara celebration from the film. Where it's like, this is my patch type of thing. Look, KL has been a revelation this season, right?

[00:17:52] He's batted low down the order. He hasn't opened the batting. He may have to open the batting soon. Who knows? I don't think so. I think if Jake goes out as he's sure. I mean, listen, I would either leave Jake out. Will you just move Karan? Play Faf or you move Karan up a little, right? Yeah, I mean, you play Faf if you can. But I don't think you play Faf and Jake. I think you play Faf and Karan. Yeah, yeah, Faf instead of Jake. Although, I mean, Jake's ceiling is like so high, right? Yeah, but his floor, man, has been so... Yeah, the floor can only ever be zero. Yeah, but he's been very close to it.

[00:18:23] Anyway, no. Yeah, KL's been fantastic, man. Like, he's kind of really held the team together. He's batting well. He's hitting the ball well. So, today as well, while he was there, it looked like India... Oh, India, no. DC were going to go home. Yeah. It's been a good season for Keir. I think shrugging of the captaincy has helped him as well. He had that extra pressure at LSG.

[00:18:53] You can see what he's doing to our boy Rishapant at Lucknow. He was having an awful, awful season so far. Yeah. But yeah, just keeping wicket and batting is what he does well. And he's doing it well. So, I'm really pleased for KL Raul at the moment. All right. DJ, let's take a very quick break. We will come back and talk a little bit more about Lucknow and Chennai. And all the other things that have gone down in the last couple of weeks of the IPL. Don't go anywhere. You are watching the Edges and Sledges Cricket Podcast.

[00:19:22] We will be right back. Welcome back to the Edges and Sledges Cricket Podcast. I said watching because we're live on YouTube. So, if you're on YouTube with us, hit that like button. Hit that subscribe button. Leave us a comment. We'd love to hear from you. But also, thank you to all our listeners for tuning in. We always love to hear from you all as well. We're at OneTipOneHand on all the socials. And love when you write in and tell us how your season's going.

[00:19:52] Also, play Fantasy Cricket with us. It'll be in the show notes. It'll be in the description on our YouTube video. If you're not joined yet, you can join our league at any point. I'm having a very mixed season. I picked Jake as my captain today. And he got out for a bunch of duck. But it's not bad. It's been fun. I've had some good picks. DJ, you mentioned the Lucknow teams. I want to jump to them and talk about them. Okay? Fourth on the table. Eight wins. Eight points. Four wins from six games. You're like, that's not a bad start, man.

[00:20:19] I mean, that's up there with Gujarat and RCB tied with Delhi, although Delhi's played one fewer game. And yet you're feeling like their biggest, the most expensive purchase this season, their biggest purchase, their skipper, has just not found it. I mean, Lucknow is coasting on the back of two batters and two batters alone. That's Nicholas Puran, currently holding the Orange Cap. And Mitch March, currently third in line for the Orange Cap. And others have come and gone and played cameos.

[00:20:47] Just talk to me about Rishabh Badd. Right? Like, what do you think is going on? How much of it, by the way, Mitchell Stark started his season last year? Absolutely awful. And then found his form and bode well and eventually did well in KKR's run to picking up the trophy. But is there something about, although a player doesn't ask for a certain amount of money in an auction, is there something about the pressure that's coming to Rishabh with just the price tag that's on his head and all the coverage about that?

[00:21:17] I don't think Rishabh Pan thinks that much about stuff. But I think you're right, that there is pressure that comes with the price tag. But I don't think Panth takes that pressure. I think when we spoke to Jaira Vinatkat, he said that there was a lot of pressure when he was the IPL's most expensive player at one point. Panth is now the most expensive player in the history of IPL, right? Ever. I think he's suffering a little bit from playing at a ground which doesn't suit his natural game, if that makes sense. Yes.

[00:21:47] Big boundaries, kind of slow turning track. Although Nikki P seems to be doing fine. I don't know. And I said Marsh, but also Markram. Like Markram is a good player. Yeah. But man, those three have just dominated with the bat. And then you have Digvesh is doing really well with the ball. Shardul is having a breakthrough season. You know, first two games were better than the last couple.

[00:22:11] But sometimes I also wonder how much Indian cricketers who are in the kind of A-list motivate themselves for something like the IPL. Yeah. Because they play a lot of cricket, right? Like he's come back from Oz. He didn't play in the Champions Trophy actually. Yeah. But he's got like a five test series coming up against England. It's, I mean, it's a relentless, yeah, you want him to score runs all the time and all of that.

[00:22:40] But like, I don't mind him having a bit of a dip, to be honest, in the IPL. And I actually sometimes struggle with like how someone like Kohli motivates himself to be like so on it in a format he doesn't even play. Maybe he's on it because he hasn't won the IPL. Yeah. He has something he's chasing, yeah. Yeah. But it's a personality thing. I think Pant can quite easily just switch off for like an entire season and then he'll be fine when he picks up the gloves and tests whites again and he'll be fine with the bat as well.

[00:23:09] I mean, it's not like he's, it's not like he's done anything different than he does usually. He's falling over. It's the same stuff. Yeah, it's the same stuff. It's just not worked. I don't think he loses any sleep about this. I don't think anyone is stressed out about his spot on the team. Yeah. I do especially think that with poor unbatting as well as he is and Marsh and Markram and

[00:23:36] then just some of the bowlers showing up, I think when Pant shows up, Lucknow is going to feel pretty good about it. But yeah, I mean, it'll be interesting to see. I mentioned this on our last episode, but in the Lucknow game against Delhi, there were definite, definite moments where they lost that game due to captaincy. And so it's going to be interesting to see how much of a rope or a leash he gets to. I think they're going to not play Pant. Absolutely not. He walks into the side, even in bad form. I think there's a world where he doesn't lead for a long time.

[00:24:03] Like if maybe they give him this whole season or something, but mega auctions are not for another two years or three seasons. Yeah, but Pant won't stay in a franchise. I don't give him captaincy. But it's not so much... As we found out to our detriment. Yeah, it's not so much that. Well, when I say detriment, we're currently almost off the table. I more mean, does he realize he doesn't want to be a captain? He'd rather just be a keeper. Like being a keeper captain and a batter who bats in the top of the order is a lot of work. You can say maybe it's easy to be a keeper captain and bat at night.

[00:24:34] It was a perfect transition. They're playing each other tomorrow. It's CSQ versus Lucknow tomorrow. It's going to be great. Pant versus Dhoni. Set up. Let's talk about CSK. Now that we've come to it naturally. Man, you look at the points table and you say, this is one victory from six. And it was the first game they played this season against the Mumbai Indian, who've also had a really bad run.

[00:25:03] Also, absolutely abysmal net run rate. Before I share any specific commentary, just talk to me about what's going on with the CSK side. Because in the first game where after Guyquad was ruled out and Dhoni came back, Dhoni was leader of this team. And he's now going to lead through the end of the season. CSK comes out and makes 103. I think it was for nine technically. And loses the match in 10 overs.

[00:25:30] But you're not seeing anybody. You know, the IPL is one of those things that when things work, these big decisions, these bold moves, like on paper, sides look awful and then they come good. And on the CSK team, you're not looking and seeing Ratchin Conway, both Kiwis, both play in the test setup. Tripathi, Vijay Shankar, Shivam Dube. And then in some order, Jadeja, Ash, Dhoni, Deepak Huda have come in and out. Noor is a purple cap holder.

[00:26:00] So it's not an issue with their spin. Khalil's actually had a good season with the ball as well. But it seems like a major batting outage. What do you think is happening overall with CSK? Where do they go from here? Like all the Dhoni jokes and stuff aside, how do they fix this? I mean, you need your top three to score runs, right? Realistically, in a tournament that's this long, you can quite easily even win a tournament, not even getting to number five and six in most of your games.

[00:26:30] I think Gujarat Titans in the first season pretty much just did that. Like Gill and those guys would just not. Miller would come in at like 4-5 and that would be it. Like Tevati have batted, I think, three or four times in the whole season. So you need, it has to be top heavy. It's not a bad top 4-5, to be honest. Like Conway, Ratchin, Tripathi, Puda, Dube, they're all pretty good players. They just haven't clicked. So here's the thing. Bad form. On paper, it's not bad.

[00:27:00] The challenge is when they're not in good form, where do you go? Who do you go to, right? So you mentioned those four or five guys. Okay, who's on their bench? You have Deepak Huda, which we said. Is it Moeen? Moeen? No, Moeen's KKR now. Moeen's replaced Narayan, sorry. Moeen used to be in a CS game. Moeen replaced Narayan in that game. So then you've got, you look at their squad then, and you say they've got Shreyas Gopal, Kamlesh Nagar Koti, Jamie Overton,

[00:27:29] Sam Karan, Nathan Ellis, and you start going down the list, and it's all bowlers or bowling all-rounders. Like, they have, and Mukesh Chaudhary, who's played already. Vanch Beidi is a wicket-keeper batter who I haven't heard too much about. He played the Delhi Premier League with Priyancharya and stuff. But did they just get their squad composition wrong in the auction, right? As you're looking here, saying, like, we have a couple guys who are having bad batting days. What do you do? You're just rotating Tripathi, Shankar, Dubey, maybe Huda, but you have nowhere else to go with batting.

[00:27:58] Yeah, I mean, Ritu carried a lot of their batting. And he was the one that was looking a class apart even while he was fit. And they've tinkered with, like, he was dropped down to three, which was a bad move. I mean, he's, I think he's won the Orange Cup twice, maybe, top of the order. Why would you do that to a guy who bats like that at the top of the order? It's ridiculous, right? Anyway, I think where they're going to go is, maybe tomorrow, is they're going to put Sam Curran at the top of the order because Dody loves a little bit of that. Yeah, that would be really interesting.

[00:28:29] One of the Kiwis is probably going to lose a spot, probably Conway, who I think got retired out in one of these games. Yeah, who would deserve it if he loses his spot. Yeah, he scored 69 of 49, and then, I mean, that's an ODI knock, man. That's not going to work. Great ODI knock. Yeah, but Sam Curran's got a little bit about him. He was T20 player of the tournament in 22, in England 1. He's played for CSK before. He was, at one point, I think, the most expensive player in the IPL. So he's got skills.

[00:28:58] So I think that's one answer that they need to find pretty quickly. I don't know why he hasn't played. So I think Ghrachin probably keeps his spot. He also needs, like, a Jadeja to start smacking them around. Ashwin needs to take some wickets. He just needs people to start coming together because this is the... Yeah, this is going to be an issue for CSK fans. And, I mean, a lot of it's now been overtaken by the MS Dhoni mania, right?

[00:29:27] Like, your team is 71 for 7 or whatever, and you're screaming, Dhoni, Dhoni. Yeah, and it's really... I get it, but, like... I'm enjoying the jokes and memes as much as anybody, but it's got nothing to do with Dhoni. You don't win matches off of your number 7. You win the occasional match off of your number 7. But even for that, you need one guy, one, just one, in the top order to stand up. And then there's 7 can back you up, right? Whether they've had it 7 or 9. It's just... It's just tough. Now, it's a long season,

[00:29:56] and these are all incredibly talented guys. So somebody will come good. It's just hard when it's not working, and maybe, as hard as it is that Ruta Raj is missing out as an incredibly talented young Indian player, maybe the change will just force... You know, Dhoni, to your point, we'll try something different. Sam Curran will go up the order, get a quick fire 50, and it enables the rest of the order to bat and play their more comfortable form of cricket. Speaking of Indian stalwarts who've struggled a little, let's talk about Ruhat Sharma.

[00:30:27] How hard has that been to watch, man? Like, I was trying to pull up his last few innings, but it has just been absolutely disastrous. I mean, again, I kept in... How much does he care? This is the point, right? How much does he... He's just won the Champions Trophy. He wants to go to England. He's got a contract. He has to... See, this is the thing, right? He's won the IPL five times. It's not good. He's not got the goalie stuff. He's not captain of the team. So, Rahit this season... He's just won the Champions Trophy. He's going to go to England, captain India.

[00:30:57] In order, just quickly, 0, 8, 13, 17, 18. He's living his best life. I mean, and he got... He got Impact Player subbed off today. Yeah. Awesome life. Just batting... Like, that's the dream when you're a kid, right? Just bat quite a few six... It's great. But no, but... In all seriousness, like, how invested will Rohit Sharma be in this IPL? No, so... Is that good for... This is... This is... Yeah, this is something that team owners

[00:31:26] now need to take into account, I think, while putting their teams together. Like, how invested is this big marquee Indian player going to be in my franchise playing? Yeah. And by the way, linked to that, this will be a good last couple of things to talk as we wrap up this episode, but... Do you feel like we've sort of hit a wall? Maybe this is harsh, but we've sort of hit a wall a little bit with the marquee players. And by that, I mean... Don't get me wrong. Indian players are doing fantastic. Like, I'm...

[00:31:56] You've seen some great, great work from Saikishore, Digvesh Rati, Vipraj Nigam has been on Revelation, 20 years old, all leggy, leg spinning, leg spin bowling all-rounder who can hit the ball out of the park. Ashutosh. Ashu, of course. Ashu and Shashant last year. Vignesh. Vignesh has been great too for Mumbai. Priyansh Arya. And a magnificent century from Priyansh. I mean, this guy came straight out of the Delhi Premier League where he had 6-6s in and over and had showed up on the IPL stage and just crushed it, absolutely.

[00:32:26] Have we hit a wall a little bit with the overseas players like that? Who are the overseas players we're still talking about? Narayan, Russell, like Sam Curran, these guys who've been around for, I mean, Russell and Narayan, like where's this 20 to 24-year-old young overseas players who are going to come hit? Now, some of it is a function of the 4 versus 11, 4 versus 7, overseas versus Indian guys. But I don't know, DJ, it just feels like we're not getting that young overseas talent, finding them early, bringing them in. I mean,

[00:32:56] Al-Zari Joseph came in one year and took plenty of wickets in his initial, his first couple of matches. He played like two games and then he was for 6 for 12, I think he got it. Yeah, like, where are those spells, right? You've had Spencer Johnson play, I think Nathan Ellis got a look for CSK. You're just, you're just, I don't know, I'm having this existential, like we're playing these marquee guys like the Dhonis and Rohit because they bring in crowds. Got it, fair. Then the overseas slots are just being eaten up by these guys who, it's harsh to say, but are past their prime

[00:33:25] in my eyes. And we're just missing a little bit of that energy with the IPO. Yeah, it's, it's an interesting one. Maybe the scouting is more focused on India. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Will Jacks play for Mumbai? I'm trying to think. Jake was a great, great buy last year and he came halfway through the IPL, I think. Yeah. Into the side. But the other overseas performers are, so Noor, of course, Rashid feels like he's

[00:33:55] getting, and I know Rashid's kind of still young, but in IPL experience, he's been around the block. He seems ineffective. Hazel Wood Stark has had a decent start, but Nicky P's done great. Right? So I'm not saying it's a broad-based thing, but it just doesn't feel like Joss Butler has had one good knock, one, two, one or two average knocks. Travis Head similarly. So it's not, maybe it's not, maybe it's a harsh observation. It just doesn't feel like we're finding these young guys who can come and play brilliant knocks. I mean, yeah, the things Pat Cummins are still playing,

[00:34:25] they've all, as you say, they're more established names. That's probably, again, a function of people going for more established names because they know there's only four spots. They want to guarantee availability. There's probably less scouting outside of India. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's, you don't have the kind of Shane Watson and the Jack Callis and the Chris Gale and the Dilsha and AB and yeah, yeah,

[00:34:55] South African. It seems like, as you say, there's a little bit of fading of that kind of foreign talent. I mean, Ryan Rickleton played a little bit today. Yeah. Klaassen is still, I mean, he's good, but again, these are all established players, right? But they, I think the teams go for more established names because they need those guys to deliver. They're seen as, I guess they, like in county cricket terms, they'd be seen as the professionals that are there to deliver. Like you go for a stock, you go for big money, you go for Klaassen, you go for big money.

[00:35:26] Yeah. A bit of Klaassen Ranga. He's done pretty well this season. Absolutely. I like it. And the Sri Lankanthian general, Thikshana, Kamindu Mendes, they've done fine. I just, yeah, I just, I get it. I think you rely on your four slots to be reliable. I'm sitting here saying Delhi may not play four overseas guys, right? Yes, there was a Harry-Brooke dynamic and all that, but if you end up picking Stark as your bowler, Jake is, you leave Jake out and you play

[00:35:55] Faf when he comes back and like, it just feels like, it just feels like they're not helping lead the way they used to, but again, Nikki P is an exception. There's lots of exceptions. All right, DJ, as we wrap up this week's episode, right? Let's talk quickly about this trend of retiring batters out. You mentioned Devin Conway, 69 out of 49, got retired. The more controversial one potentially was Thilak, who was not hitting the ball great, but he'd been out there for a while, was batting with Hardik Pandya, gets retired out,

[00:36:24] and then Sandner comes in and Hardik denies him the single. So, if you were just going to want somebody to run, you should have left Thilak out there. And then Hardik proceeds to then not be able to win the game from there, which is hard. Finishing games is hard, but what is your take on this retiring out? I like it in principle, but I don't think sides have executed it well. And, yeah, just wanted your reaction as we wrap. It's, I think the biggest argument against retiring someone out is that Tevati are not in charge. Yeah.

[00:36:54] Yeah, took forever to get going and then went. Yeah, he took Cotterill for five sixes and then won over, right? I think, so, this trend started, Ashwin, if you remember, with Ravi Chandran Ashwin being retired out. He's a bowler who can bat and he had done his job, they'd lost early wickets, he'd come in early, smacked a few around and then he said, okay, I'm going to hand over to others to finish the job. I'm not a massive fan of this retired out business. It's just, I mean,

[00:37:25] if you're getting Santner in instead of Tilak Verma, that's just stupid. Yeah. Like, what? Like, Tilak Verma is one of the world's best batters at this point in time. He plays for India, he bats number three, India's a world team 20 champion. He bats above Surya Kumari Adav. And he asked for that one time and came in and went nuts. What are you thinking? Like, come on Mahela. What the hell? Yeah. That was a brainless move. I'm not a fan of that. Conway again, like, look,

[00:37:55] who came in instead of Conway at that point? I don't remember, but it must've been, it must've been somebody. I think it may have been a Jadeja, which I can still kind of get, but like, why would he not back a batter to do a batter's job? Yeah. The Ashwin thing, I get, like, that's how it started. Yeah, that's fair. He's not in between. This is like, just trying to over engineer something that should not be tinkered with. Yeah. Let the batters do their thing. And the greatest argument ever was probably that the Tevatiya Yeah.

[00:38:25] retired out, like he was 20 of 20 before he just went berserk and won the game for Rajasthan, right? Yeah. And Rajasthan was the one that pioneered that retired out thing. Yeah. They didn't retire him out at that point. Yeah. Yeah. So when Conway, when Conway retired out, he was for the fourth wicket to fall. So it was for Jadeja. Yeah, you're right. But anyway, very, very interesting. DJ, how's your fantasy been going? Well, I can't. So what's happened is for the last few years, I don't know,

[00:38:54] someone at the BCCI hasn't done their GDPR compliance work. Yeah. So the UK doesn't allow you to play. Yeah. So I've just, I'm bored. I can't, I'm just not going to. So when we did Fanzania, that was fine. Yeah. But like dream 11, bro, I'm sure you've got enough money to afford a decent lawyer in the UK. Just figure it out. Just figure it out. And let people in the United Kingdom play. Otherwise, this is not going to happen. I'm sorry. That's not. If you're listening to anybody from dream 11 here, DJs, please. And please try to get that fixed.

[00:39:23] Even if you get it done sooner rather than later. I made my team and stuff, but then I'm just like, via VPN. I'm just like, this is so boring. This is just not worth it. To log into VPN every time. Fair enough. Well, if any of the rest of you aren't in the UK and are playing, join our fantasy league. You'll see it in the show notes here or in the YouTube description. Thank you everybody for joining. DJ, thank you for joining me on a, on a Sunday evening. It's been, it's been great. Busy couple of weeks. Next week, actually Varun and I are going to be watching some of the

[00:39:52] IPL games together, not live, but from the US. So that'll be great. We'll be there next weekend. We'll be back hopefully next week and we'll, we'll talk a little bit more and we'll see how the points table is holding. I can't imagine CSK will stay win, stay near the bottom. I can't imagine Delhi after this will stay. So lots of fun. Beginning of the end. We're at one tip, one hand on all the socials. Leave us a comment. We read every single one. We'll be back next week. Thank you everybody for joining us. This is the edges and sludges cricket podcast signing off.