Top 5 individual bowling performances in IPL history
Cricket is, for the most part, a batsman's game. The shift to larger bats and smaller boundaries has meant that scores of 300+ are more than common in ODI cricket and teams are regularly surpassing the 200 mark in T20 cricket.
This favouritism to batsmen is also seen to a certain extent in the IPL, where it rains sixes on a packed out crowd. Nevertheless, there have been some magical moments where individual bowlers have dominated the opposition batsmen. This article looks at the top five individual bowling performances in the history of the IPL.
#5 Lasith Malinga: 5/13 vs Delhi Daredevils in 2011
It is impossible to leave Lasith Malinga out of this list. Malinga is the IPL all-time leading wicket-taker, with 154 wickets to his name. This is 20 more than Amit Mishra in second place.
The Sri Lankan fast bowler has been terrorizing batting line-ups for many years, but one particular performance stands out in particular. This was his 5/13 against the Delhi Daredevils in the fourth match of the 2011 IPL.
Malinga started in lethal fashion, unleashing a vintage toe-crushing yorker to knock over David Warner with just his second ball. After another yorker, which Unmukt Chand managed to dig out, Malinga crashed into Chand's stumps with a fast in-swinger which ended up hitting the middle of middle stump. It was an imperious start from Malinga.
He was so good on that day that even explosive Indian opener Virender Sehwag could not figure out how best to play him. Indeed, Malinga's second over was a maiden to the veteran Indian international, in a display of fast, probing bowling. He was then taken off for a while and brought back in the 16th over.
The carnage then resumed as Malinga took two wickets in three balls, once again yorking Venugopal Raul and another toe-crusher sent Morne Morkel back to the pavilion.
Malinga didn't get a chance to bowl out his quota, as Ashok Dinda tamely chipped him to mid-off to dismiss the Delhi Daredevils for just 95. The combination of pace and accuracy made this spell a delight to watch and is the perfect example of how to bowl in T20 cricket.