Australian left-arm pacer Mitchell Starc, who is back in the ‘IPL circus’ after almost a decade, made a comeback during the Kolkata Knight Riders’ first match at Eden Gardens on Tuesday. Batted with the new ball in the second warm-up match and was bowled by Rinku Singh at the death. The Australian, who last played in the IPL for Royal Challengers Bangalore in 2014 and 2015, was acquired by KKR ahead of IPL 2018 but missed that season due to injury. Shah Rukh Khan’s side broke the all-time auction record this year by buying him for Rs 2,475 crore to bolster the pace of their attacking attack which has lacked energy of late. “It’s always a bit of a circus when this is the best T20 league in the world. It’s definitely a new challenge. Yeah, it’s going to be exciting. So, yeah, I’m looking forward to it,” Si Tucker told cricket.com.au.
“I guess my memory of RCB in 2014 and 2015 is still very distant, but, yeah, I’m really excited to be a part of it. A new group of players, obviously. A group of people that I certainly haven’t seen or met. We used to work together,” he said.
When representing the purple team in the warm-up match against the gold team, the 34-year-old player seemed very positive.
Starc bowled at full strength with the new ball, giving Rahmanullah Gulbaaz and 18-year-old Angkrishna Raghuvansh some anxious moments in the opening overs.
Rinku Singh hits a six to Mitchell Starc
This is a movie theater! pic.twitter.com/zQNhfPrqSR
—(@KKRWeRule) March 19, 2024
He produced the odd bounce at the slow Eden wicket, with 2022 U-19 World Cup winner Ankrish being beaten many times outside the stumps.
Starc troubled Afghanistan batsman Gubaaz with an awkward bounce and then trapped him LBW in an eventful start with the score at 1-0-1-1.
Defending deep fine leg, Starc made his mark in the second over when he stretched a skier to his right to pull Venkatesh Iyer off Andre. Knocked out off the bowling of Andre Russell.
On the third bowling, Starc again beat Ankrish a few times before the youngster charged at him and pulled out a boundary with a nice leg.
Angrish followed with another boundary – a beautiful drive through the ravine.
Mitch Starc takes the purple wicket – we can get used to this!pic.twitter.com/Xgls0JoQmH
— Kolkata Knight Riders (@KKRiders) March 19, 2024
Starc also ran hard while saving a few boundaries before he was called out for a death delivery at the crease along with Linku and Manish Pandey.
Rinku and Manish gave it their all to break the gap and the Australian found himself on the receiving end, conceding 20 points in the final over to finish with figures of 4-0-40-1.
Rinku started at six over in the middle of the final over and Starc erred on his yorker and ended up bowling a full delivery.
But overall, Starc put in an energetic performance ahead of Saturday’s match opener against Sunrisers Hyderabad.
The effort is sure to go down well with their two-time IPL winning captain and current team mentor Gautam Gambhir, who coaches alongside head coach Chandrakant Pandit Watched the game from the seats.
Meanwhile, former England captain Andrew Flintoff watched the match from the sidelines and exchanged pleasantries with the KKR team management.
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