New Delhi. The ICC T20 World Cup 2024 has so far not seen the magic of batsmen that fans have been waiting for. The reason for this is the slowness of West Indies and America’s wickets and the slowness of the outfield. Most of the matches have been low scoring. The dominance of the bowlers over the batsmen can be understood from the fact that less than a dozen matches are left in the tournament and scores of 200+ have been seen only four times. There were also matches in which teams from India, South Africa and Bangladesh defended scores below 120.
Not only in terms of runs, but also in terms of fours-sixes, this World Cup could not make cricket lovers happy. Only 729 fours and 389 sixes have been hit till Bangladesh-Australia match of Super 8 (44th match of the tournament). The average of sixes per match is around 8.84 and fours around 16.56, while usually in T20Is, more sixes and fours are hit in an innings of a match. This is the situation when all the Super 8 round matches have been shifted to West Indies where the wickets are better for batting than America. After the bowlers rule in the group matches, now the batsmen will rule the future matches and we can hope that the fans’ desire to see ‘Rasad’ of fours-sixes will be fulfilled.
The low number of sixes hit so far in the tournament also has an impact on the ‘account’ of experienced batsmen. The ‘account’ of sixes of some famous batsmen known for their violent batting is still empty in this tournament, including Matthew Wade of the Australian team who reached the Super 8, Shakib-al-Hasan of the Bangladesh team and Ravindra Jadeja of India. This is Wade’s fourth T20 World Cup, while Shakib has played in all 9 T20 World Cups so far. This is also Jadeja’s sixth T20 World Cup.
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Wade earned praise by hitting 3 consecutive sixes off Shahin.
Australian wicketkeeper batsman Wade has scored runs at a strike rate of 140.00 off 15 balls in two innings of 5 matches in this T20 World Cup, but is yet to hit a six with his bat. It is true that Wade hasn’t had many innings and balls to play so far, but his image is that of a batsman who has dominated the bowlers right from the start. The tournament wicket is slow and the ball is stopping many times, so this is not possible. Let us tell you that Wade has hit 46 sixes in 90 T20s. He hit Pakistan’s Shaheen Afridi for consecutive sixes off the last three balls of the 19th over of the 2021 T20 World Cup semi-final to send Australia into the final. Australia won the World Cup by defeating New Zealand in the final. In this match, Wade played an unbeaten innings of 41 runs in just 17 balls with the help of two fours and four sixes and changed the course of the game and made the victory possible for the team.
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96 balls played but Shakib has not been able to score 6 runs so far
One of the best all-rounders in the world, Shakib has so far hit 52 sixes in 127 T20Is. As for the current World Cup, he has scored 100 runs (avg. 25.00, strike rate 104.16) in 5 matches off 96 balls with one half-century but not a single six. In 41 T20 World Cup matches, Shakib has so far scored 842 runs with the help of 73 fours and 23 sixes while taking the most 49 wickets. Like these two, India’s Ravindra Jadeja has not been able to hit a single six in this tournament so far. The team of these three players has made it to the Super 8. It is expected that fans will see him hitting sixes in future matches.
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Other batsmen who could not hit sixes included Mendis, ‘Chacha’ and Rachin.
However, the list of batsmen who have not hit a single six in the T20 World Cup 2024 is very long. It includes names of strong batsmen like Kusal Mendis of Sri Lanka, Rachin Ravindra of New Zealand and Iftikhar Ahmed of Pakistan. All these batsmen’s team could not make it to Super 8. Among them, Kusal Mendis has scored 1629 runs in 67 T20Is at an impressive strike rate of 134.40, including 74 sixes. However, whether it was a result of bad pitches or poor form, Kusal managed to score only 75 runs at an average of 25 off 67 balls in the three matches of the current World Cup. He could not hit a single six.
Pakistan’s Iftikhar Ahmed popularly known as ‘Chacha’ was also furious with the bat in the T20 World Cup. He could score only 25 runs in two matches. Iftikhar has hit 44 sixes in 66 T20s so far. New Zealand’s Indian-origin player Rachin Ravindra, who became the ‘light’ of everyone’s eyes with his explosive performance in the World Cup (ODI) 2023, will also want to forget this T20 World Cup as a nightmare. Unbeaten once in three matches, he managed just 17 runs with not a single six or four. T20 World Cup 2024’s ‘classless’ pitches have similarly embarrassed many other batsmen. Let us tell you that Rachin Ravindra was among the top-4 batsmen in the World Cup (ODI) held in India last year. He scored 578 runs in 10 matches with the help of three centuries including 17 sixes. Similarly, Kusal Mendis hit 15 sixes and Iftikhar 8 sixes in the ODI World Cup.
Tags: ICC T20 World Cup, Matthew Wade, Shakib Al Hasan, T20 World Cup
First published: June 22, 2024, 07:45 IST