Lucknow Super Giants have invested time and money on Ravi Bishnoi and Nicholas Pooran. It now seems a while ago, but Bishnoi was one of LSG's out-of-auction signings before their maiden IPL season. In the most recent IPL auction, LSG kept bidding on Pooran till they acquired him for INR 16 crore. They spent 20% of their salary budget on one player.
That's because Bishnoi and Pooran are both quintessential X-Factor players in T20s. A hard-hitting batter and a wily wristspinner are two types of cricketers who can turn white-ball games around within an over. Give them a couple of more overs to settle, and before you know it, they are all over you. It was a lesson that Kolkata Knight Riders got on Saturday night.
In both innings, KKR held the aces after the first ten overs, only for these two men to snatch the advantage back in LSG's favour. It started off with Pooran walking in at No. 7 in only the 11th over and LSG's score reading 73 for 5. He stayed till the penultimate over of the innings and by the time he was dismissed, his five sixes and four fours in a score of 58 gave LSG a defendable total of 178.
Then, when KKR seemed to be running away with the chase, blitzing to 78 for 1 in 8.2 overs, the squeeze began with Bishnoi dismissing Nitish Rana and stringing together a series of tidy overs. He frustrated Andre Russell before picking up his wicket in the last over and completed his four-over spell with miserly figures of 2 for 23 that included 10 dots and only two boundary shots. In a must-win game for LSG where the margin of victory was eventually just one run - thanks to Rinku Singh's continued heroics - without either of these two performances, LSG would've been nervously waiting for Sunday's games to know their playoff fate, a position they'd hated to be in.
That LSG had their nerves jangling was visible even as Bishnoi spoke after their win. "To win a game like this, the morale is down. Oh sorry - I mean the morale is high. See, I can't even talk properly (laughs). We were feeling scared every ball," he said.
"I haven't seen anyone bat like Rinku Singh for a long time. The way he has batted this season, it is unbelievable. We knew if we bowl a string of dot balls, then it will be tough for them to chase. The goal was wickets or dot balls, the plan was to bowl stump to stump and the challenge was to ensure we do that."
Even as Bishnoi beamed in the glory of LSG securing a second consecutive playoff appearance, it would never have been possible without Pooran's innings. Bishnoi was essentially closing what Pooran had initiated.
Pooran had walked in at No. 7 - wearing the Mohun Bagan maroon that is reminiscent of his national team colours - with a rescue job at hand. LSG's top order had essentially failed, and were in real danger of posting a total that would not be competitive in Kolkata. The natural order of things was that Pooran would take a few overs to get his eyes in, having the luxury of entering in the 11th over, but he did the opposite. He smashed 23 in his first 10.
This was not the Pooran we know. Even though he has built his game as an imperious hitter, Pooran is not a very quick starter. In his last three years of the IPL, his first-ten-ball strike-rate when coming in before the 14th over had been 116.4. Even when he walked in after the 14th, the corresponding strike-rate was only 135.6. But here he was, playing against the grain.
It was such a jolt to the KKR bowling that they looked helpless for a brief moment. Having neutralised Varun Chakravarthy's danger in his first three deliveries by hitting him for two fours and two sixes within his first ten balls, he pounced on Suyash Sharma and Vaibhav Arora through the late-middle overs. He also ran hard in Ayush Badoni's company and reached his fifty in 28 balls by hitting the first of two consecutive sixes off Shardul Thakur. Even though Pooran fell, his 42-minute stay had changed the game's complexion.
"I knew I had to go as deep as possible," Pooran said. "I knew that once the spinners were bowling, they'd give me some bad balls and I was ready to capitalise on this small ground.
"I've been batting pretty decently through the tournament. And when you're batting well, you need to take advantage of it, and today was a must-win game for us. Ayush and I had a partnership in Chennai that was similar to this. And I told him we have to go as deep as possible and also pick our moments."
The bottom line is that Pooran's most recent innings is an extension of his IPL 2023 form. This is his best IPL season - in terms of runs (358), fours and sixes, and strike-rate (173.78). According to Pooran, he finds joy in "repaying the faith" to a team that has "backed him immensely" but LSG head coach Andy Flower has a different theory; Pooran 2.0 was unlocked after his brief captaincy stint with West Indies.
"One thing that would help his development as a bloke and a team member is his captaincy experience with West Indies recently," Flower said. "Once you experience the variety of challenges that come your way when you're captain, it makes you a much better team member.
"He made the difference today. It takes a lot of confidence in yourself to hit balls that early in your innings. It has been wonderful to have him remaining in our dugout for that last section of a 20-over innings. He is getting greater clarity on his game, each time I see him. Today was a wonderful mixture of boundary hitting, six hitting, and also alternating the strike so that he elongated his innings.
"He's a beautiful striker of the ball. He's worked on his bat swing. And he knows that if he gets the ball in a certain area then he'll clear the boundary. And he's done that with trial and error with a lot of boundary-hitting practice. He's put in the hard yards to get to where he is now. And he's also had a lot of ups and downs in his young career. We think people will have linear developments - heading upwards - but that's not how life works and how international sport works.
"He's had some bumps along the way, but I do think that captaincy experience has helped. He's realised how tough it was and now I think he appreciates the game and his team-mates even more. And that's what brings a really balanced young man to the party."
LSG needed a hat-trick of wins in their last three league-stage games to secure a playoff spot. They now need another hat-trick of wins to take the IPL title. Saturday's Pooran-Bishnoi show will ensure the side remains in a happy space. And now they have earned the right to put their feet up and enjoy Sunday's cricket to learn who their opponents at the eliminator will be.