IPL: 5 stars whose shine remained only for one season
IPL has a knack for throwing unlikely superstars into the cricketing arena. The roots to the success of many established International superstars go back to their fabulous performances in IPL. Shane Watson, Manish Pandey, Sohail Tanveer, Ambati Rayudu, Hardik Pandya, Krunal Pandya, Jasprit Bumrah are some of the names in this exhaustive list of players who made it big after a fabulous IPL season.
Finding stardom through IPL is only the tip of the iceberg as it takes consistent performance to keep up that stardom and repute. Over the years, there have been many instances when a player conquered the hearts of the cricket crazy Indian fans in one season but couldn't live up to the expectations in the subsequent seasons which ultimately resulted in a quick descent from the heights of fame. Some of such players have even gone into the oblivion.
Here, we take a look at five one-season wonders who couldn't repeat their good performance in subsequent seasons:
#1 Swapnil Asnodkar (2008)
Asnodkar was a part of the title-winning Rajasthan Royals (RR) outfit in the debut season of the IPL. He was used as a punt player who was tasked with opening the batting for Royals and give some blistering starts alongside an experienced Graeme Smith. The young 24-year old lad didn't disappoint his captain-cum-mentor, Shane Warne, as he along with Smith provided some solid starts which paved the way for the onslaught by the likes of Watson and Yusuf Pathan.
Asnodkar was diminutive in size but was fearless in taking the attack to the opposition bowlers. He had a brilliant Ranji Season in 2007-08 where he scored 640 runs at an average of 71.11. The lad from Goa continued his rich vein of form in IPL too, as he scored a total of 311 runs from 9 games at a very good average of 34.55. His opening partner, Smith, also rocked the batting charts as his tally stood at 441 runs from 11 games in the tournament. More importantly, the duo went on to become a stable opening pair who provided great starts to the team and took care of the run-rate.
Asnodkar could not reproduce his 2008 chronicles in the next season which led to his exile from the IPL arena. Though he remains one of the highest run-scorers for Goa in first-class cricket with 5883 runs from 88 matches, his debut stint with RR remains the high point of his career.