The Indian Premier League (IPL) has been a perfect platform for the young Indian cricketers to showcase their talents to the world. Over the last 13 years, many players have sky-rocketed in their careers owing to a phenomenal performance in this league. However, the latest reports related to the IPL might not delight the uncapped Indian players. A few franchises reportedly want to increase the number of overseas players in their playing XI from four to five. The USP of the IPL has been that the franchises can pick nine overseas Players in the auction.
However, they need to go with only four of them on the field. Generally, each team has five capped Indian players and the other two slots are allotted to the upcoming stars. Unfortunately, if this rule is applied next year, quite a few promising talents might end up warming the benches.
Still, this decision may benefit quite a few teams. In this article, we will look at those five franchises.
Rajasthan Royals
The Rajasthan Royals had their worst IPL season this year. The inaugural winners had to settle with the last position on the points table. Steve Smith and the team management took some questionable decisions in the league stage. They preferred the overseas players over the uncapped players like Manan Vohra and Mayank Markande.
In case the overseas limit is increased to five, RR can either strengthen their fast bowling attack by including Andrew Tye or Oshane Thomas. Or else, they could opt for David Miller’s services in the middle-order. Thus, RR would benefit a lot.
Chennai Super Kings
IPL 2020 could have been much better for the Chennai Super Kings if the five overseas players rule was in place. IPL 2019 Purple Cap winner Imran Tahir warmed the benches for almost the entire season. He could have played more games definitely.
Meanwhile, someone like Josh Hazlewood would also feature in the lineup regularly. Even Mitchell Santner could have bolstered the lower middle-order with his presence.
Royal Challengers Bangalore
Royal Challengers Bangalore rotated the overseas stars regularly in IPL 2020. The fans saw that Josh Philippe got to play a few games and then Moeen Ali came in. Similarly, Aaron Finch also lost his place to Philippe, while Dale Steyn did not get a longer run.
Moeen Ali could have benefited a lot with this rule because the team management would have preferred him as a finisher then. Nevertheless, the same did not happen.
Kolkata Knight Riders
Kolkata Knight Riders were another franchise which struggled to form a stable lineup in IPL 2020. They started the season with Dinesh Karthik as their captain. They tried Rinku Singh and Nikhil Naik in a few games.
Lockie Ferguson was on the bench and even rising stars like Tom Banton and Chris Green did not receive regular opportunities. The option to have a fifth overseas player in the lineup would have allowed KKR to field the Trans-Tasman duo of Ferguson and Pat Cummins from day one. Eoin Morgan, Sunil Narine, and Andre Russell could have filled up the other three slots.
Kings XI Punjab
Kings XI Punjab had to exclude Chris Gayle from their match squad in the initial few matches because of this restriction. When the management agreed to get him back in the team, Gayle was not cleared to play.
They persisted with Maxwell the entire season, but the Aussie all-rounder could not fire. Jimmy Neesham went in and out of the team just like Mujeeb Ur Rahman. Thus, KXIP could have had a stable lineup from the beginning if there was a rule to allow five foreign players.
The chances that the BCCI approves this proposal are very low because the Indian players are the focal point of this league.
