IPL 2018: Star players who need to fight for their places in the starting eleven
The Indian Premier League is the most competitive cricket league in the world. The players have to be fully-fit and be at their best always to feature in the playing eleven of any franchise.
Though the franchise owners shell a lot of amount on the players, not all of them get a chance to prove their price tags.
The contrasting perceptions of the management and the captains have made even the costliest buys to sit out for most parts of the tournament in the previous editions.
Let us now look at some of the players who will have to fight for their places in the starting eleven this season.
#3 Karn Sharma (Chennai Super Kings)
The leg-spinner has played for three different franchises so far- Royal Challengers Bangalore, Sunrisers Hyderabad and Mumbai Indians.
Sharma has won two titles in his career so far. In 2016, he won the title with Sunrisers Hyderabad and then in 2017 won the title with the Mumbai Indians.
He was bought by the Chennai Super Kings for INR 5 crore in the 2018 auctions and the two-time IPL winner is yet to make his debut for the Chennai Super Kings this season.
In 55 IPL matches, Sharma has scored 316 runs at a strike-rate of 116.60. He has taken 49 wickets at an economy of 7.67, with the best figures being 4/16.
He is yet to don the Yellow jersey this season, has to fight for his place in the CSK's starting eleven, since they have a plenty of spin-bowling options this season- the likes of Harbhajan Singh, Ravindra Jadeja and Imran Tahir.
His chance of playing for the Super Kings looks highly unlikely in the upcoming games as Chennai seems to have settled well with their spin-options.