Two more matches remaining in this IPL 2019 with three teams still left in contention. David Warner topped the charts among the batters and Kagiso Rabada was the top wicket-taker in the league stage. Both players, however, are back in their home countries, one training for the World Cup and another, hoping to get back in shape for the big tournament this summer.
But while Warner and Rabada’s influence in the success stories of their respective franchises cannot be denied, there are also a few unique feats accomplished by some of the players this IPL season.
Here’s a list of what some of the numbers won’t necessarily tell you.
Highest Dot Ball Percentage
Among batsmen who had faced more than 100 deliveries in the league stage of IPL 2019, Shane Watson was the only one with more than 50 percent dot balls.
The Chennai Super Kings batsman faced a total of 208 deliveries in the league stage; he did not score off 105 of those. However, when he did bat, the Aussie amassed 268 runs across the league stage.
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Most Runs Scored Through Twos
David Warner ended his IPL 2019 campaign with the Orange Cap; the Sunrisers Hyderabad opener scored 692 runs in 12 matches at a strike-rate of 143.87 and at an average of 69.20. The Australian, who has a reputation of being a destructive batsman, impressed with his running between the wickets too; in IPL 2019, he scored the most runs running the singles, twos and threes. Warner collected 195 runs through singles, 126 runs by running the twos and 12 runs running the threes.
To compare and lend perspective to how good Warner was in running between the wickets, the next highest number of runs scored by running twos was 72 – by KL Rahul.
In fact, while it will go down in the record books that Warner ran 63 twos, he actually ran many more twos for his partner’s runs; particularly in his partnership with Jonny Bairstow, there were several occasions when the two batsmen hared between the wickets to pick up a brace.
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Best Economy in Powerplay
Among bowlers who bowled at least 10 overs in the powerplay, Mohammad Nabi had the best economy rate. The Sunrisers Hyderabad off-spinner bowled ten overs in the powerplay and returned combined figures of 5 for 45.
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Most Successful Bowlers in Innings’ Phases
For years, batsmen have been categorised as specialist openers, middle-overs players or finishers. Perhaps, beginning IPL 2019, we should start identifying bowlers as being specialist powerplay bowlers, middle overs bowlers or death overs bowlers.
The Chennai Super Kings pacer Deepak Chahar was the most successful powerplay bowler; he picked up 12 wickets when bowling in the first six overs and had a pretty acceptable economy rate of 7.43. Another Chennai Super Kings bowler – Imran Tahir – dominated proceedings in the middle ten overs; the South African leg-spinner collected 19 wickets and kept things quiet at an economy rate of 6.23.
The Delhi Capitals speedster Kagiso Rabada picked up the most wickets at the death; the South African collected 17 wickets when bowling in the last four overs, conceding runs only at 8.90 runs per over.
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Dismissing Captains Most Often
Shreyas Gopal’s stocks rose significantly in IPL 2019. The leg-spinner – who has the wood on Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers – would be the Rajasthan Royals’ top wicket-taker in the season, bagging 20 scalps in 14 matches. He dismissed the opposition team captains on 5 occasions – the most any one bowler had dismissed captains in IPL 2019; apart from dismissing Kohli twice in the season, he also dismissed the Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma, the Sunrisers Hyderabad captain Kane Williamson and the Delhi Capitals skipper Shreyas Iyer.
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Bowler Conceding Most Sixes
“Who hit the most sixes?” is an often-discussed question around the IPL; Chris Gayle tops the all-time list of six-hitters in the IPL, while his fellow-Jamaican tops the 2019 list. But who has conceded the most sixes in the IPL? Hardik Pandya conceded 23 sixes – the most any one bowler had conceded in the regular league season in IPL 2019. In all IPL, Piyush Chawla was hit for 171 sixes – the most any one bowler had been taken for.
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Even among batsmen categorised ‘finishers’, there are certain batsmen who one can bank on to do plenty of damage in the last over. MS Dhoni and the last over is a special relationship; it is therefore not surprising that he has scored the most runs when batting in the final over of the innings in IPL 2019. The CSK captain scored 74 runs from 24 balls at a strike-rate of 308.3 when batting in the final over this season.
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Closest Ever IPL?
One wouldn’t be too wrong in saying IPL 2019 was the most-competitive season ever. At the end of the regular league season, only one point separated the fourth-ranked team and the bottom-placed team. In addition, it was the first time in the 12-year history of the league that a team had progressed past the regular league season with 12 points.
22 of the 56 league matches – which equate to nearly 40 percent of the games – were decided in the last over!
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