IPL 2025 | Chahal — slight of frame, big of heart

Yuzvendra Chahal glided across the Chepauk outfield, his face bathed in a wide smile, and went sliding across the turf, striking a pose that is unique to him – lying on his left side, left elbow on the ground, right wrist on his right thigh. It had been three years since he had done that, at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai, but you don’t forget these things in a hurry, don’t you?

The provocation for Wednesday night’s signature pose was the second hat-trick of his IPL career, as he became only the third bowler after Amit Mishra and Yuvraj Singh to produce more than one hat-trick in the most visible T20 league in the world. His victims might not send shivers down the spines of most bowlers – the horribly out of sorts Deepak Hooda, Anshul Kamboj and Noor Ahmad – but hey, who’s complaining? A hat-trick is still a hat-trick, right?

Yuzvendra Chahal
| Photo Credit:
MURALI KUMAR K

That it came in the 19th over of Chennai Super Kings’ innings against Chahal’s newest franchise, Punjab Kings, was of particular significance. Like most captains across the tournament have started to do, Punjab skipper Shreyas Iyer kept a couple of overs of Chahal’s leg-spin in abeyance, as much because he hadn’t had a good night until that point as because a certain Mahendra Singh Dhoni was still in the dugout, still awaiting his turn to bat. Even at his peak, Dhoni was an iffy starter against spin, and wrist-spin specifically. And clearly, at 43, Dhoni is certainly not at his peak.

Chahal’s two previous overs as CSK sought to erect an imposing edifice batting first were largely unremarkable, yielding 23 runs with no success. After 18 overs, with Dhoni and the big-hitting Shivam Dube in the middle, the five-time former champions were 177 for five, eyeing a late flourish and potentially their second 200-plus score against Punjab in as many games this season.

Enter Chahal, slight of frame, big of heart. His first ball was oh-so-Chahal – looped up, above the batter’s eyeline, daring him to have a go. Problem was, it was a little too wide. Dhoni had a cursory look, then let it go. One wide, 178 for five.

The next ball was another invitation that Dhoni, who seldom leaves the crease these days to the spinners in attack, lapped up gleefully. Full on middle, met with the middle of the bat. The ball sailed over long-on and was taken just in front of the CSK dugout by Ravindra Jadeja. 184 for five. Glances exchanged, saliva swallowed.

Shreyas’ heart must have been pounding though perhaps not as furiously as Chahal’s. But seeing the leggie, you just wouldn’t guess. He was calm on the exterior, expressionless, seemingly unfazed by the presence at the opposite end of the man largely credited with making his international career with his pithy, uncanny, wise inputs from behind the sticks.

Common sense might have suggested that, having got seven off one, CSK and Dhoni would have been better off by putting Dube on strike. The muscular left-hander from Mumbai made a name for himself at the Chennai franchise with his repeated and merciless takedown of spin of all varieties in the two previous seasons, a skill that earned him a berth in the India T20 World Cup squad of last year, where he continued to bash skill with impunity.

But Dhoni is anything but predictable. Perhaps, he thought after the first six, there was no reason why he couldn’t produce another. Hence a slap at the next ball, a leg-break outside off. Standing in his crease, the weight almost on his back foot. He hit it well, to be fair, just not well enough. The ball hung in the air, a million eyes followed its trajectory and a million hearts shattered when the little white orb nestled in Nehal Wadhera’s hands at long-off. Dhoni gone for 11 off 4. Strike one to Chahal. To Shreyas. To the back-room staff, to the proponents of match-ups and stuff like that.

Almost everyone must have felt Chahal had done what he had been summoned to do, but then again, Chahal isn’t almost everyone. The Dhoni wicket, as it turned out, was the mere appetiser before the three-card main course whose hapless victims were Hooda, Kamboj and Noor in that order. 2-0-23-0 became 3-0-32-4 in not so much the blink of an eye – an over takes a fair amount of time when four wickets fall in six legal deliveries – and the damage had been done.

CSK eventually were bowled out for 190, losing their last five wickets for six runs and going down by four wickets with two deliveries to spare. A close contest, by all means, settled by Shreyas’ bruising 72 that won him the Player of the Match honours. But why did Punjab have to chase just 191 when at least 10-15 more appeared on the cards until Chahal came back for his decisive third over? How about a shoutout to the hat-trick hero? Four wickets in an over – surely, that was deserving of the Player of the Match award? Surely?

Being politically correct

Cricketers, more than anyone else, will tell you that they don’t play for individual glory. That they don’t target numbers, that they don’t crave awards and recognition. Maybe that’s what they feel they are expected to say, that that is the politically correct thing. But who wouldn’t want to be hailed and eulogised and recognised and rewarded, especially when their heroics come in a winning cause? Four for 32, a hat-trick thrown in – for what it’s worth, which may not be a great deal, Chahal was our Player of the Match, the hero of the night. No disrespect, Shreyas.

That being said, if Chahal were indeed even mildly disappointed at not receiving that honour, well, he is quite used to disappointments by now. He must have experienced a sense of betrayal – let’s not sugar-coat it by terming it anything else – when Royal Challengers Bengaluru (at the time RC Bangalore) let him go ahead of the auctions leading up to IPL 2022. Chahal had been a part of the RCB family since 2014. Well, not just any part, but an integral, crucial, wicket-taking part, an influential cog in an otherwise underachieving bowling wheel.

At the unforgiving M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, Chahal held his own despite the flat tracks and the small outfields. He teased and tormented batters of all ilk with his guile, with his variations, with his nous, with his cunning and craft and with the impishness that comes to the wrist-spinner, more than anyone else. He picked up more than 50 wickets at a venue that was once the graveyard of bowlers in 20-over cricket. In all, he bowled more than 400 IPL overs for RCB, picking up a staggering 139 wickets. Strike-rate 17.43, economy 7.58. Why would you let him go? Especially when, for all the hype and hoopla, there still wasn’t a title to show then? As there isn’t now too, truth to tell.

RCB’s loss by design became Rajasthan Royals’ gain, who netted him ‘cheap’ – pardon the word – at ₹6.5 crore. Unaffected by the modest (for him, at that stage of his career) sum, he got down to business, picking up 66 wickets in three seasons – strike-rate 16.25, economy 8.41. It was with the 2008 champions that he got his first hat-trick in 2022 at the Brabourne, his victims being the Kolkata Knight Riders trio of (interestingly enough) future captain at Punjab Shreyas, Shivam Mavi and Pat Cummins.

With collective success continuing to prove elusive, Rajasthan rejigged their spin resources at the November mega auction in Jeddah, letting both Chahal and R. Ashwin go. By his own admission, Chahal, already 34, was a little sceptical, a little apprehensive. Even though he was part of India’s T20 World Cup-winning squad last year, he didn’t play a single game. His last outing for the country was in August 2023. How would he fare at the auction?

Swimmingly, as it turned out. New captain Shreyas and new head coach Ricky Ponting went all out to secure the leggie’s services, doling out ₹18 crore, the most a spinner has ever commanded in IPL history. It must have done Chahal’s confidence a world of good – not so much the staggering amount alone as the fact that he had triggered a bidding war, that he was a resource very much in demand, that it wasn’t just he alone who believed he had plenty of cricket still left in him.

The 2025 season at his new team didn’t begin with promise. Perhaps he was still weighed down by the burden of personal issues, perhaps he was still finding his feet. Whatever the reason, he picked up only two wickets in his first five games. And, he leaked runs. Including 56 in four overs against Sunrisers Hyderabad, with Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma making a mockery of a (seemingly) steep target of 246.

But the tide would turn, wouldn’t it? The class had to out, correct? That happened three nights later, in Mullanpur, with Punjab successfully defending 111 against holders KKR, the lowest total batting first in IPL history to result in a victory. Chahal took four for 28. As if to show that that was no flash in the pan, he picked up two for 11 in three overs at – ermm – the Chinnaswamy in a rain-affected match to show RCB just what they had given up.

After a tepid start to his stint with Punjab, Chahal now has 13 wickets this season – among spinners, only Noor and Krunal Pandya have more wickets. Already the leading wicket-taker in the IPL, he is putting daylight between him and the chasing pack. And he is far from finished. That’s great news for Punjab as they chase their maiden title, not such great news for the rest of the field.