How will teams adapt to UAE conditions at IPL 2020? Indian Premier League Cricket | Cricbuzz.com

While the teams have already started training, for the strategists it’s all about simplifying things in the lead-up to the tournament.

Shortly after the conclusion of the Indian Premier League auction in December, one of the questions asked of Venky Mysore was whether the franchise “had any assurances from Pat Cummins, Cricket Australia or the authorities” that the pacemaker would not. he would withdraw from the tournament after pocketing an offer of 15.50 million rupees. “Any foreign player who puts his name, we all have guarantees and guarantees from IPL that they have not only made commitments from the players but also from the boards,” said the Knight Riders CEO, before blatantly adding: “I have a suspicion of that with 15.50 million rupees will come. “

It wasn’t just a tongue-in-cheek response, because the Knight Riders have had to deal with interrupting the withdrawal of foreign players in the past. Mitchell Starc dented them by withdrawing from IPL 2018 primarily due to injury. A year later, after the franchise fired Starc over a text message, Mysore revealed that the franchise would base its strategy on player availability. In a tournament like the IPL, a good auction is crucial for the team’s chances. And therefore a player who is lost due to injury or retires leaves a nasty cut even before the battle begins.

Several teams left quite satisfied with their auction performance last year, only to find themselves rebuilding their strategies now. And with the tournament moved to the UAE entirely due to the Covid-19 pandemic, all teams have been forced to recalibrate their plans to some degree. The move may have left some of their strategies redundant now that they won’t have the comfort of a home base, while plans for specific places in India have gone out the window. Simon Katich, the head coach of Royal Challengers Bangalore, has been candid enough to admit that his IPL auction plans have been affected.

“When we had the auction, we were planning a team assuming we will play half of our games at the Chinnaswamy (stadium),” says Katich. “When you have a high-scoring stadium like your stadium, that influences the composition of your team. Now with UAE, yes, there is a slight variation.”

For Mike Hesson, RCB’s director of cricket, the focus is now on ensuring that players and the pool of experts do not “fly in the dark.” “We have collected a lot of information from a variety of tournaments over the last five years,” he says. “We have spent a great deal of time since we knew it would arrive in the United Arab Emirates, even two or three months before, making sure we have collected as much information as possible so as not to fly blind. We will play in three places but the reality is that we will not train at the venues. “

But with all teams on the same page, now it’s about who gets ahead with the stakes. For that too, there are plans underway.

While teams have already started training, for strategists it’s all about keeping things simple in the run-up to the tournament. It is not something you are not familiar with. For Sriram Somayujala, who has worked as an analyst around the world with various T20 and T10 teams, including Delhi Capitals, there is a silver lining. “When it comes to my data, I have to work for just three different places. It actually saves me time,” he says in a conversation with Cricbuzz. “The grounds are studied based on certain metrics. Things like the proportions of the ground, the size of the boundaries, the type of gate, etc. will help us with our plans.

“We can expect the fields to be cool at least for the first few games (scores like 160-170) but there will definitely be a big dew factor in these places. So I guess teams will start to prefer chasing in places like Sharjah and Abu Dhabi. “.

Bowlers will be happy playing in Abu Dhabi considering the longer limits

Extensive experience in the same fields as an analyst has also helped Somayujala come up with a plan in which she finds the similarities or differences with places in India and strategizes accordingly. “What I did is that out of the eight terrains in India, I made a group of three. The grouping style, as I said before, is based on studying the places in certain metrics, such as the dimensions of the terrain. For example, Sharjah is located among the smallest places in the world, something like Indore, because it is a very small piece of land: the distance from the central gate to the road is only 92 m! “

But that is not all.

“We are also looking at the par scores achieved in the past in the day and night games. The on-field scores do not need to be similar between the day and night games. But along with this, you need to understand how critical it is to get the las correct combinations are, if you need to have a lot of spin or rhythm, depending on the terrain, and even when the games are played, “he says.

But while terrain dimensions are a part of planning, Somayujala also explains how it might dictate the pairings. “The dimensions of each field will be different. In Abu Dhabi, there could be many more runs scored by singles and doubles because the diagonals are bigger there than in Dubai and Sharjah.

“A plan that we make for KL Rahul may be different than the one we have for Rohit Sharma, or it may be the same considering the dimensions and conditions of the wicket. Someone like Rohit can score runs in any wicket, but we have to take into account in how he scored those runs in tournaments like the Asian Cup. “

Sunrisers Hyderabad analyst Shrinivas Chandrasekaran has also been following the same pattern as Somayajula. “It will continue to work in our favor [moving to UAE] Because we generally play a good wicket in Hyderabad, it is generally a flat wicket. One expects a similar type of surface in Dubai, with a fairly similar dimension, “he says.” In Abu Dhabi, we will have a bigger venue that none of the bowlers will complain about.

“So if you look at that aspect, Dubai is very similar to what we played (in Hyderabad); in Abu Dhabi it will look like you’re playing in Jaipur because the surface is also on the slower side and once you go to Sharjah, it’s more like bowling in Chinnaswamy. You know how he’s bowling in those places, so it’s about going there and adjusting to those surfaces. “

UAE Headquarters since January 2016

Matches included: PSL + T20I with Pakistan

IPL matches in India since 2016

Percentage limit in the United Arab Emirates and places in India

UAE venues include: PSL + T20I involving Pakistan since 2016; Indian venues include all IPL matches since 2016

To have a global vision, the data studied is also substantial.

“PSL, the Afghan Premier League, the associated cricket that has happened here and also the Pakistani matches here in the UAE, we look at all the available data on the matches played in these fields. What can help to understand is how they change the scores and combinations in various stages of a tournament, “says Somayujala.

If the recently concluded Caribbean Premier League is any indicator, leaving pitches with less recovery time is sure to favor bowlers, particularly closers who prefer cutters and spinners, a fact that has not gone unnoticed by strategists. of the team. But whether similar patterns can be expected this time is a question best answered through coincidences. The variables are still many, as venues are set to watch cricket after a 283-day interval.

“I would see it as a challenge and not a problem,” Somayujala said about the whole process of rethinking strategies. Given the many unanswered questions that remain, you could bet that this edition presents a lot of challenges for all teams.

With additional input from Ganesh Chandrasekaran and Deepu Narayanan