Travis Head and Jake Fraser-McGurk put on the fireworks for Sunrisers Hyderabad and Delhi Capitals as an Indian Premier League trend towards batting hyperdrive gathered still more momentum.
Opening with the similarly proactive Abhishek Sharma, Head hammered 89 from 32 balls to push the Sunrisers to an unprecedented 125 from the six-over power play. The previous world record in all Twenty20 matches was 106 by Nottinghamshire in 2017, while the IPL record had been 105, by Kolkata also in 2017.
Travis Head is in blistering form in the IPL.Credit: AP
Delhi’s reply, chasing a distant 266, was supercharged early on by Fraser-McGurk, who has made an impact in each of his three IPL innings so far after being brought into the side following a hamstring tear for Mitchell Marsh.
By crashing his way to 50 in a mere 15 balls, Fraser-McGurk bettered Head's mark for the fastest half century for the tournament, set little more than an hour earlier in the game.
However, the Capitals’ chase lost momentum once Fraser-McGurk was dismissed for 65 from 18 balls, and left the team coached by Ricky Ponting with five losses from eight games. Sunrisers, captained by Pat Cummins and coached by Australian assistant Dan Vettori, have moved up to second with five wins from seven games and a series of scoring records.
To put their feats in context – as all IPL scoring rises notably in the new phase of the impact player rule – a tally of 266 was the fourth-highest total in tournament history but only Hyderabad’s third best score this season.
Delhi’s captain Rishabh Pant was left lamenting the absence of significant dew to hamper bowlers in the second innings of the game after choosing to send the Sunrisers’ hot batting line-up in first after winning the toss.
"The only thought process behind [opting to bowl at the toss] was we thought there will be a bit of dew, which did not come," Rishabh said at the post-match presentation. "If we could have restricted them to 220-230 we still had a chance. [The ball] stopped more [on the surface] in the second innings than what we anticipated. But when you have 260-270 to defend, it gives bowlers confidence."
In some ways, the new level of productivity being reached by Sunrisers at the start of an innings mirrors a similar revolution nearly 30 years ago, when Sri Lanka's openers Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana monstered the new ball during a much more conservative era to help lift Sri Lanka to the 1996 World Cup.
Jake Fraser-McGurk in action for Delhi.Credit: AP
Head (84 from 26 balls at the end of the sixth over) and Sharma (40 from 10 balls in the same period) effectively decided the contest in six overs, despite Fraser-McGurk's riposte. His impactful start to a first IPL campaign raises the question of whether the Australian selectors can find room for him in their 15-player squad for the Twenty20 World Cup to be played in the Caribbean and the United States in June.
For Ponting, the advent of the impact player, which effectively gives each side an extra batter as the player is nominated after the coin toss, has been a clear plus for spectators and as such may be something that players and coaches will have to get used to.
“It looks to me like [the impact player is] having an impact on the game,” Ponting told ESPNCricinfo this week. “More runs are being scored. So you’d think people that were sitting back and watching that game last night would be mesmerised by the cricket. I was getting messages last night saying what a crazy game of cricket [Hyderabad v Bangalore], what an unbelievable game of cricket.
“So if the impact player is making it a better spectacle, then it should stay. From a player’s point and a coach’s point of view, the game would be much easier if you just pick 11, just pick your best 11 and put the 11 on the park and go and play.
“Because I’ll tell you now, we’ll sit back after training tonight and select our teams and you’ve got to pick two teams and you’ve got to have your five impact guys. There’s so many different ways you can go around doing that, looking at different combinations. It actually can be a bit of a nightmare.”
In English county cricket, Australia’s Marcus Harris proved his own nightmare for Derbyshire’s bowlers, cuffing a double century in the division two match at Derby.
Playing in the UK after losing his national contract earlier this year, Harris pinged 26 boundaries and a couple of sixes in an innings brimful of crisp strokes, including plenty of scoring down the ground in addition to his traditional strengths square of the wicket.
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