5 young pacers India must groom after IPL 2024 ft. Harshit Rana
IPL 2024 season was one where bowlers played 75 percent of games like second citizens, realizing that it was now time they needed to stop worrying about 'taking wickets' and just try to be as smart as possible to "let wickets happen."
But somehow, simultaneously, it also became a season where a brilliant crop of fast bowlers emerged out of the ashes. Five stood out, with their variety of skills and despite getting different times in the middle for varyingly functional teams.
Watching them gave fans a sense of excitement for India's T20 future. Let's take a look at them and the reasons why the Men in Blue should look to groom them after IPL 2024.
#1 Mayank Yadav
The first and the most obvious choice. The Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) speedster Mayank Yadav set IPL 2024 on fire with his short burst in the first half of the season. Clocking 150 kph and over consistently, he took six top and middle-order wickets in his first two games, winning both matches for LSG.
More than his pace, though, it was the consistency with which he targetted the top of the stumps, leaving no chance for batters to drive, let alone hit a big shot.
But just when he was making waves internationally, he got injured in the third match. LSG put him under medical supervision for a few games but his body broke down in the final over of the match against the Mumbai Indians, ending his season.
And that's where the issue lies. He has immense talent. Talent India hasn't seen a lot of. Umran Malik too has pace and there's work probably going on behind the scenes on his consistency. Mayank is a unicorn but he can only make a career out of his skills if he's fit and strong enough to play for a few months without injuries.
That'd be the grooming part for India, the difficult part for him, but it'll follow immense success at the highest levels.
#2 Harshit Rana
Perhaps not as exciting as Mayank for eyes searching for aesthetics, but Harshit Rana was the most promising fast-bowler to have come through from IPL 2024. The fact that he got Heinrich Klaasen out in KKR's first match and the final of the season, foxing him with his slower ones tells everything you need to know.
He had the most wickets for an uncapped bowler in his first full season - 19 at an average of 20.15, despite bowling in just 11 matches. His biggest quality is his height, rhythmic action, and drastic variations in pace, which surprise batters more often than not, combined with a mind that reminds one of Zaheer Khan.
He was the one bowler who could have been in India's T20 World Cup reserves and no one would have batted an eyelid. After the World Cup, India would want to keep him around and develop him with both bat and ball, while also strengthening his already athletic bowling to make it work for the longer formats too.
#3 Simarjeet Singh
Unlike Harshit and perhaps even Mayank, Simarjeet Singh wasn't in his franchise, the Chennai Super Kings (CSK)'s initial plans. He got a chance after a small injury crisis at the team which saw Deepak Chahar, among others, get ruled out.
The Ruturaj Gaikwad-led side brought in Singh for an away clash against the Punjab Kings and he bowled a brilliant spell of 2/16. In the remaining three games, he went wicketless twice and took his IPL-best figures of 3/26 against the Rajasthan Royals in the third. On that roller-coaster ride, there was a lot of promise.
He played like a proper ODI middle-overs bowler in a T20 set-up, troubling the batters with his hard lengths, a surprisingly good pace for his simple action, and seam movement when they were looking to freely play their shots.
You can teach swing and variations but the use of angles he showed was just a gift of experience. Among all the pacers in this list, he's the closest to the finished product but just needs some work on his body and guidance to break through.
#4 Yash Dayal
If you check the graphs for the entire season, the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB)'s left-arm quick Yash Dayal derived more swing than most bowlers in the powerplay in IPL 2024. And then, in the decider against the Chennai Super Kings (CSK), he showed that he had all the tools - mental and physical - to perform under pressure.
Playing your first full season at RCB, half of the games at the Chinnaswamy Stadium, seeing catches dropped and edges fall short, and still coming out with 15 wickets in 14 games with an average of 30.60 is no mean feat.
The issue with him is not fitness or anything like that, at least right now. Instead, it's about understanding whether he's truly over that controversy of sharing a racist story on his Instagram profile. If that issue is sorted, he has shown the skills and the steel to be able to represent India in all three formats one day.
#5 Rasikh Dar Salam
A silver lining in Delhi Capitals' mundane season, Rasikh Dar Salam was kind of a combination of the aforementioned players. He can swing the ball, hit the hard lengths, bowl in any phase at a consistently high pace, and has had to overcome his share of struggles to reach where he is.
He used these skills to take nine wickets in eight games at an average of 29.89. He's the kind of bowler who's perhaps the most raw among others on this list but also someone with an extremely high ceiling. If the Indian team can see and polish that, they could have a star in the making.