By Malcolm Conn
Mitchell Starc may hold the record as the most expensive player in IPL history, but of the 53 players who have taken a wicket in the world’s most cashed-up cricket competition this year, Starc is not one of them.
In a crazy bidding war between the Gujarat Titans and Kolkata Knight Riders back in December, Starc went for a staggering $4.43 million. Calculated on the IPL’s 14-match regular season – and Starc bowling four overs in each – that breaks down as $316,438 a game, $79,107 an over and $13,296 a ball.
Yet in the opening two games of the Knight Riders’ season, Starc’s collective figures are 0-100 while conceding 12.5 runs an over.
His recent debut for KKR against Sunrisers Hyderabad, containing his Test and one-day captain and long-time NSW teammate, Pat Cummins, was highly anticipated.
Unfortunately, Starc was smashed for 26 runs in a single over and finished with 0-53 off four overs. The second match against Royal Chargers Bengaluru wasn’t much better, conceding 0-47 from his four overs. Despite his struggles RCB won both matches and are second on the table.
So what’s gone wrong for the cricketer that IPL money confirmed was the best white-ball bowler in the world?
Mitchell Starc has gone wicketless for the Kolkata Knight Riders.Credit: AP
Steve Smith, who is at the tournament as a commentator after being overlooked in recent auctions, thinks he knows.
“He was looking to wobble the ball across the right-handed batter, which is a good option, but I feel like he’s got to swing it back down the line,” Smith told Star Sports.
“He is a left-hand fast bowler who can bowl at 145 kilometres an hour plus. There’s nothing like a ball swinging back into a right-handed batsman. It’s one of the hardest balls to face. So I’d like to see that first and use that one [going across the batsman] as a variation trying to nick them off.”
Former Indian left-arm fast bowler Irfan Pathan had a similar view.
“When that looping swing starts to the right-hand batter, it can be lethal. And I haven’t seen that in the last two games,” Pathan said.
“It could just be the pitches, or it could just be getting used to Indian conditions. Once he starts getting that inswing, he will be a bowler to watch out for throughout the IPL.”
Starc sat out of the IPL for eight years to ensure his body was fine-turned for whenever Australia needed their fastest bowler, costing him an estimated $10 million in lost earnings.
Now aged 34, and with Australia’s next assignment the Twenty20 World Cup in India and the West Indies during June, this was the perfect time to rejoin cricket’s biggest superannuation fund.
It paid off in spades during the IPL auction late last year when Cummins, who captained Australia to the 50-over World Cup title just months earlier, set a new record of $3.67 million, only for Starc to smash it an hour later.
But as Smith has found over the past three years, interest from the IPL franchises’ ever impatient billionaires can drop off quickly.
Sports news, results and expert commentary. Sign up for our Sport newsletter.