MS Dhoni is the captain of the Pune SuperGiants. Their four best foreign stars Kevin Pietersen, Faf Du Plessis, Mitchell Marsh and Steve Smith will not be playing the IPL any more this season due to injury.
IPL nine has so far seen a very high proportion of injured players, so much so that a brilliant team of match winners and can form a match-winning team of their own.
Let us see who they are?
Openers
Lendl Simmons and Aaron Finch. Simmons was the best batsman for Mumbai Indians last IPL. A back injury kept him out until the semi-finals of World T20 when he returned to knock India out in his home ground of Wankhede.
Sadly for MI , the injury resurfaced and he is out of IPL nine
Aaron Finch, after starting so well for the new Gujarat team is out with hamstring injury.
Middle order batsmen
Kevin Pietersen, Steve Smith and Faf du Plessis. KP was expected to be one of the stars for Dhoni’s team. The former English star too got injured just day after he spoke of his dreams of playing Test cricket for South Africa after a couple of years.
Similarly Faf Du Plessis, a key player for Dhoni and his team, is out with a broken finger. One more blow to Dhoni and his team was the loss of Aussie Skipper Steve Smith, almost immediately after scoring a blistering 100.
All rounder
Mitchell Marsh is a key player as he both bats and bowls well. Unfortunately he has joined the injury list.
Bowlers
Lasith Malinga, a key player for Mumbai Indians is out due to a persistent knee injury, as is Mitchell Starc. Samuel Badree played a key role in West Indies T20 triumph and also suffered a shoulder injury.
Starc, Badree and Malinga were out before the tournament started. Starc and Badree being injured leaves his team batting heavy and with no bowling firepower.
The team looks pretty impressive, doesn’t it? There is no wicketkeeper but I don’t want to tempt fate.
Replacements
The quality of replacements are excellent and in one or two cases the replacement may actually be better than the original injured player. Prolific Aussie Usmaan Khawaja, Kiwi opener Martin Guptill, quicks Jerome Taylor and Chris Jordan and South African Chinaman bowler Tabraiz Shamsi are the replacements so far.
Why so many injuries
This is indeed a worrying thought. Several thoughts come to mind. Is too much cricket being played? Is T20 too intense? Is there not a sufficient implementation of the rotation policy?
These are all worrying questions. What are the answers?
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
Yes Perry Bridge . Warner and Zampa are doing well indeed. Since i wrote this article there are more players in the injury list. Adam Milne has headed back to NZ with a torn hamstring. Shaun Marsh, Joel Paris, Hastings and Maxwell too are injured. so many injured players in a few weeks time is alarming . autralia especially has been very hard hit
Perry Bridge
Guest
Can note too that Warner has about 470 off 8 completed innings. Meanwhile Khawaja has 57 from 3 knocks. AH well.
Perry Bridge
Guest
Good to see Finchy back and firing for the Lions. His unbeaten 50 the other day coming in down the order gave them a total at least to try to defend meanwhile his 29 off 10 balls put the run chase well ahead of time and only the run out stopped him being there at the end - and they still did it with 2 overs to spare. 276 from 5 completed innings is a pretty good return given an injury interruption in the middle of it. He seems right again now. How about Zampa and 6-19 off 4 overs.....in an ultimately losing performance with the run chase butchered.
Pom in Oz
Roar Guru
NOOO! That was M*A*S*H...
Simoc
Guest
Wasn't Klinger in Dads Army? Gotta say Maxwell was mostly totally hopeless last IPL and is continuing the trend. He doesn't seem to understand that he has been worked out and needs to adapt. Playing conventionally he would be great but is so busy trying to be smart. The players are coming off big seasons into IPL which is the biggest stage. They're not fit enough or need to manage themselves better.
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
Paul D thanks. So many injuries are not a good sign indeed.
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
True Ryan. I had the same thought. They will really murder almost all opposition.
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
JamesH. I had made it an 11. "Old warhorse, Ashis Nehra, who made a spectacular comeback to the Indian team in the shortest format is struggling with fitness and is out. Similarly John Hastings, who played a key role for Gautam Gambhir’s KKR team which has started IPL well is also out due to ankle injury". This para was edited out, maybe by error. Thanks for the correct observation. Interestingly Shaun Marsh too has joined the injured list as well
dan ced
Guest
Klinger would've dominated the IPL if he wasn't signed for Gloucs ;)
JamesH
Roar Guru
These are all good players but there are only 9 of them - are you expecting a couple more to fall in the coming weeks?
AREH
Roar Guru
Wow this hypothetical XI would be one of the strongest outfits in the tournament if they could all play together
Paul D
Roar Guru
Agreed - throw in old legs and the fact that this sort of event is a bit of a Kon-tiki tour for the players and it's not surprising you get injuries.
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
Good questions. I have one more. Are they only playing matches and not training/stretching enough. I mean, its IPL, Glamour content is huge. You play a match, have a sponsors event, fly out, reach another place, play a match and the cycle goes on. Just speculating
Venkat
Guest
Well written...guess the current climatic conditions are not too conducive...are players warming up enough??.... Are they spending sufficient time at the gym and at the nets??