Kamal Ghorui
NEW CHANDIGARH: The nets at the Maharaja Yadavindra Singh International Stadium here on Monday told you everything you needed to know, if you were paying attention.Shubman Gill was at it for over an hour. Unhurried, precise, that characteristic backfoot game of his flowing like something rehearsed in dreams. Kagiso Rabada came at him, then Mohammed Siraj, then Prasidh Krishna, and yes, there were the occasional plays-and-misses that reminded you he is human after all. But mostly it was Gill doing what Gill does: timing the ball in a delectable way. When he shifted to range hitting, the intent was clear. The Gujarat Titans captain is not playing this IPL just to be consistent. He has heard the noise.
Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!Just adjacent to those nets Shreyas Iyer was operating with no enclosure at all. No nets. Just the open sky and balls disappearing into stands with alarming regularity. A couple of them landed in the midst of the journalists watching. Close shaves. Shreyas barely noticed. He went back to what he has come here to do: hit the ball very, very hard.Two batters. Two captains. Both consistently, almost stubbornly, ignored by the national selectors. Tuesday’s IPL game between Punjab Kings and Gujarat Titans has the charge of men with something to prove.ALSO READ: PBKS vs GT – Team prediction, head-to-head, pitch report, Mullanpur weather updateIyer’s story is the more maddening of the two to tell. He has now led three different franchises to an IPL final — Delhi in 2020, Kolkata to the title in 2024 and Punjab to the summit clash last season. Last year, he scored 604 runs at a strike-rate north of 175, the best among the season’s top 10 run-getters. Iyer last played a T20I for India in Dec 2023.Punjab Kings won’t need reminding of what their captain brings to the table. But they will need to ensure the rest of the batting fires with him. “The level of play that we saw from Shreyas (Iyer) last year with the bat was probably as good as he’s ever had in an IPL, and I can just see that hunger in his eyes probably burning more than ever now,” Punjab head coach Ricky Ponting said on Monday.Gill’s case is different in texture. His runs have never been the issue. Since 2023, only Virat Kohli has scored more in the IPL. The question has always been strike-rate, intent, the willingness to go over the top early. Last season, a strike rate of 155-plus showed movement in the right direction.With Matthew Hayden coming in as Gujarat’s batting coach, the conversation around Gill’s six-hitting will only grow louder.
