IPL 2016 | The Injured Premier League XI

05/04/2016

The ongoing season of the Indian Premier League has seen injuries piled up day after day, resulting in players returning home earlier and teams are left scrapping to find replacements for their star players.

The injury curse has mainly struck the foreign contingent with a total of 11 highly rated International players falling by the side during or just before the IPL extravaganza this season. Indian stars like Manish Pandey, who suffered from Chicken Pox, and Yuvraj Singh, who had an ankle injury, have also missed a chunk of the season, but the major concern for some franchises have definitely been the absence of their star overseas players, and here are biggest misses from 2016 edition of IPL.

Lendl Simmons

The World Cup-winning West Indian had missed the initials stages of the World T20 and arrived in India only at the semi-final stage. He soon returned to the injury list though, due to the same lower back injury which had kept him out of the West Indian team. Mumbai Indians brought in Kiwi opener Martin Guptill as the replacement, but Parthiv Patel and Rohit Sharma’s form has kept Guptill on the bench with him managing just a solitary appearance this season.

Shaun Marsh

Kings XI Punjab, struggling to find the right team composition, was hit with a major blow this week when Australian batsman Shaun Marsh was ruled out for the season with a back injury. After a string of losses and a new captain at the helm, Preity Zinta’s side finally looked like getting their campaign back on track with a win over table-toppers Gujarat Lions. But with this injury, it's become one step forward and two steps back. They would hope that the arrival of South African Hashim Amla will give some much-needed solidity at the top of the order.

Faf du Plessis, Kevin Pietersen, Steve Smith and Mitchell Marsh

This IPL may not have been able to provide many entertaining matches so far, but it has certainly managed to crush the myth that MS Dhoni is the luckiest captain in the world. The Rising Pune Supergiants captain has managed to lose not one, not two, not three but all of his four starting foreign players from the first two matches of the season.

Faf du Plessis went out with a finger injury, while Kevin Pietersen suffered a calf tear during the match against Royal Challengers Bangalore. Mitchell Marsh returned home with a side strain, and just as Aussie skipper Steve Smith seemed like coming back to form with a century, a wrist injury ruled him out of the season too.

Rising Pune Supergiants have named Aussie duo Usman Khawaja and George Bailey as replacements, but with just two wins from their first eight matches this season, things look very bleak for the Pune franchise.

John Hastings

Hastings hurt himself during the warm-ups before the match against Mumbai Indians but went on to bowl his quota of overs, helping the team win the match which may have aggravated his injury.

Two-time IPL champions Kolkata Knight Riders lost their Australian all-rounder, John Hastings, after he suffered an ankle injury. Hastings hurt himself during the warm-ups before the match against Mumbai Indians but went on to bowl his quota of overs, helping the team win the match which may have further aggravated his injury.

Mitchell Starc

Arguably, the biggest miss of this year’s IPL is the 2015 ICC World Cup ‘Player of the Tournament’, Mitchell Starc. An ankle injury forced the Aussie pacer to miss the entire 2016 World T20, and now the IPL. Undoubtedly, the most-feared fast bowler in the world, Mitchell Starc’s absence from the RCB bowling attack exhibits a glaring weakness in the team. Having already lost a string of matches due to their toothless bowling, Starc’s absence has been a very significant loss for Virat Kohli’s side. England’s Chris Jordan has been named as his replacement, but with all due respect to Jordan, he is no Mitchell Starc.

Samuel Badree

RCB’s Samuel Badree hurt his shoulder while diving to take a catch in the World T20 final, and he came up clutching his right shoulder. He left the field soon after and was ruled out of the IPL season early in the tournament. Although, chinaman bowler Tabraiz Shamsi has joined the RCB setup, replacing the number one spinner in T20 cricket will be next to impossible.

Joel Paris

Having made his ODI debut against India in January, 23-year old Joel Paris would have been hoping to make his IPL debut this year, but unfortunately, a shin stress reaction during a Sheffield Shield game against South Australia in Perth early last month ended those dreams. Delhi Daredevils are performing above expectations so far this season, but the left-arm swing bowler would certainly have added value to their bowling attack.

Lasith Malinga

With 143 wickets, Lasith Malinga is undisputedly the most successful bowler in IPL history. Much of Mumbai Indians’ success over the years came on the back of Malinga’s death bowling, and the fear that he instils in the opposition batsmen. Malinga has been suffering from a recurring knee injury and had missed a major portion of Asia Cup and the World T20 before finally pulling out of the IPL.