IPL 2020: CSK vs RR Game Plan 2 – Rajasthan to gamble with three leg-spinners?

The 37th match of the IPL 2020 tournament between the blockbuster teams – CSK vs RR -, could all be about match-ups. Here, we take a look at a key game plan that could play a role in the 37th game of IPL 2020 – CSK vs RR.

CSK vs RR – Will the third leggie come in?

There is a good chance that CSK might pick at least two leg-spinners if not three. In fact, even Rajasthan can take a gamble and go with three leg-spinners to stifle CSK through the middle-overs. Yes, it might be too much of the same with three leg-spinners and CSK could also counter it by holding back Sam Curran or promoting Ravindra Jadeja and Karn Sharma but the advantage of turning the ball both ways is worth considering.

The option for Rajasthan is Mayank Markande who will have good memories of playing Chennai Super Kings. After all, he took the wickets of MS Dhoni, Ambati Rayudu and Deepak Chahar on his IPL debut in 2018. The main reason for bringing an extra spinner would be the fact that CSK tend to build up quite a lot of dots during the early and middle overs of their innings. Even in this whole IPL 2020, spinners have been economical as the wickets are slowing down as expected. On the other hand, the pacers have been the ones who have picked wickets with their average also being better than spinners.

As mentioned before, there is a genuine chance that either Sam Curran or Ravindra Jadeja could be used as a floater. While Curran has previously shown his ball-striking ability, Jadeja was struggling to prove himself as a batsman in T20 cricket. This season however, Jadeja has turned out to be a completely different during the death overs. Although the southpaw’s statistics during the middle-overs isn’t great, those are numbers from earlier in the season when most of the CSK batsmen failed to show any intent. If CSK give him a free hand, there could be fireworks. Rajasthan have to be prepared for him with some quick bowling although he has marked improvement against the pacers this season.

If RR do pick a troika of leg-spinners, then Jofra Archer and Kartik Tyagi can be brought back for one over during the middle phase in order to capitalize on the dot ball pressure. It is clearly evident from the statistics that CSK batsmen have gone hard at the fast bowlers and hence average less against such bowlers when compared to spinners.

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If Rajasthan feel it is too risky to pick three leg-spinners, then they could replace Jaydev Unadkat with Varun Aaron or Aakash Singh. There is more of chance of the experienced Varun Aaron getting a go at this crucial juncture. Even though Aaron has been expensive against CSK in the past, he has a pretty good record against Ambati Rayudu and MS Dhoni which could make his selection call a bit easier.