IPL 2023: Spare a thought for Yash Dayal as Titans take on Knights again

It would have been a perfect redemption route for young Yash Dayal, the left-arm seamer of the Gujarat Titans, to shine with the ball in their away match against the Kolkata Knight Riders on Saturday.

However, it’s not going to happen, as Dayal—who became the fall guy after conceding those five sixes to Rinku Singh—is still grappling with the aftereffects of the onslaught.

There was a rather disturbing update on the 25-year-old, who made an impressive Indian Premier League debut for the Titans last season, from skipper Hardik Pandya after their last game against the Mumbai Indians.  

"I can't confirm that [on the chances of Dayal playing again this season]," said Pandya, a statement which could be understood to imply that the pacer from Prayagraj (formerly known as Allahabad) may have played his last game in this IPL.

"He fell ill and lost 7–8 kilos after that match," the captain continued, "There was a spread of viral infection during that period and also due to the pressure he had faced, his condition is presently not good enough to take the field. Someone's loss is someone's gain at the end of the day. It is going to take a long time before we see him on the field.’’

The pummelling that Dayal received at the hands of Rinku Singh made the latter an overnight sensation, while it dumped the Dayal family into the depths of despair since that fateful evening on April 9. The IPL has seen countless such last-over finishes, but the stigma of going for the maximum number of runs (31) so far turned him into the villain of the piece.

The TV pundits were as harsh on him as could be expected, and one news agency put out a story on how Dayal's mother had stopped eating after this match, seeing her son's plight. Chandrapaul, the cricketer's father, who had played some competitive cricket, had these valuable words for his son: "These are the moments sport is made up of. Even in life, you come across failures—it's important to stand up stronger."

The hardest part of Dayal's journey along the road back begins now, as the comforting words dry up. In professional sport, a newcomer like him is as good as his last outing. The fact that he made quite an impact as a supporting pace bowler in the Titans' triumph last year (11 wickets in nine matches) will be forgotten soon enough.

The youngster had fitted nicely into a three-pronged pace attack with senior partners Mohammed Shami and Lockie Ferguson, making the Titans' pace attack a difficult one to get away from.

Ferguson, back with the KKR this season, endorsed Dayal's potential during one of their press conferences in Kolkata, and felt he would come back "stronger". The job, of course, will not be easy for now, with the Titans management resurrecting the experienced Mohit Sharma in place of Dayal and the latter delivering on all counts.

Looking ahead, Yash will do well to remember some of the stellar careers which were once subjected to a similar hammering.

On the much bigger stage of the T20 World Cup, a fresh-faced Stuart Broad was famously clobbered for six maximums in one over by Yuvraj Singh, and in the 2016 final, Ben Stokes went for four sixes in the last over at the hands of Carlos Brathwaite. 

The conditions in the IPL can be quite unforgiving, as the dice is loaded against the bowlers. Then again, having come this far, hailing from a city with not much of a cricketing lineage, Dayal cannot be ready to give up. The journey of the likes of him always makes for such fascinating stories in IPL!