The Indian Premier League has long been considered a batsmen-friendly league, but the emergence of wrist spinners in world cricket is notably shaking things up.
Sunrisers Hyderabad’s Rashid Khan, Chennai Super King’s Imran Tahir and Mumbai Indians’s Mayank Markande are among a slew of wrist spinners who are taunting the normally abrasive IPL batsmen.
The most noteworthy is the emergence of the Indian duo of Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav, both of whom seem to have effectively replaced Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in the Indian limited-overs teams. Ashwin has even tried his hand at bowling leg spin to establish more weapons and another chance to make the national team.
However, wrist spinners, unlike their finger-spinning counterparts, are wicket-takers. In the shorter format of the game, it’s becoming for a necessity. At the international stage, Chahal and Kuldeep all but trounced the South African batting line up in February leading India to historic ODI series win. Both came away 16 and 17 wickets respectively, the highest for any visiting bowler in South Africa.
They achieved it by taking advantage during the somewhat dreary middle-overs that usually are a mutually imposed inactive period. Their habit seems to be a part of a worldwide trend.
Virat Kohli’s insistence to play two wrist spinners over the last a year has given the national team some dividends. It’s also captains showing faith in their spinners. From 2015 to September 2017, wrist spinners have bowled 75% more overs than preceding two years
Since July 2015, four out of the top five wicket-taking spinners in the world have been using their wrists to turn the ball.
Top spinners in ODIs since July 2015
| Bowler | Wickets | Strike Rate | Wrist Spinner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rashid Khan | 100 | 21.8 | Yes |
| Adil Rashid | 82 | 33.7 | Yes |
| Imran Tahir | 69 | 35.3 | Yes |
| Graeme Cremer | 63 | 39.9 | Yes |
| Mohammad Nabi | 58 | 36.9 | No |
| Mitchell Santner | 52 | 43.6 | No |
| Yuzvendra Chahal | 43 | 27.5 | Yes |
| Sikandar Raza | 42 | 43.7 | No |
| Adam Zampa | 42 | 36.6 | Yes |
| Moeen Ali | 39 | 61.9 | No |
Judging by the effectiveness at the international level, IPL teams are bending over backwards to have a wrist spinner in their playing eleven. And with good reason. Among the top five wicket-takers of the current IPL season, two are wrist spinners.
Top wicket-takers in IPL 2018
| Bowler | Wickets | Wrist Spinner |
|---|---|---|
| Siddarth Kaul | 11 | No |
| Trent Boult | 11 | No |
| Rashid Khan | 10 | Yes |
| Mayank Markande | 10 | Yes |
| Andrew Tye | 9 | No |
In the IPL, wrist spinners display lower averages and strike rates. With the exception of Shane Warne, Anil Kumble, Amit Misra and Piyush Chawla, the wrist-spinning phenomenon has been restricted to the last few years.
Chawla and Misra have played since the inception of the IPL and have a strike rate of around 20, little under the average of 27 for all wrist spinners.
“Can’t really put a reason, but [a wrist spinner is] a wicket-taking bowler,” said Kapil Dev in an interview with PTI. “It is difficult and not easy [to read them] and every team loves to have a leg spinner.”
But wrist spinners are a combination of high risk and high reward. Even though they’re taking wickets by the handful, they tend to be more expensive than finger spinners.
In the IPL, wrist spinners’ average economy rate is 7.8, and finger spinners are marginally less at 7.5, however their numbers are a lot more skewed since there are a plenty of part-time finger spinners who drive the numbers are up.
The gambit is paying off for captains across the IPL, especially in the case of Rashid Khan and Mayank Markande. It’s now a game of attack instead of containment. A positive result is that we’re seeing a high quality of cricket, which normally is just seeing the batsmen try to hoick it over the fielding side.
