Starc’s IPL 2024 campaign has been full of numerous crests and troughs. After becoming the most expensive player (INR 24.75 crore) in the league’s history, he was unable to fulfil his promise as Kolkata Knight Riders’ pace spearhead. In his first eight matches, he only had seven wickets to show at an economy of 11.78 per over. He had also leaked more than 50 runs thrice.

Redemption for Starc

The match against Mumbai Indians paved his redemption as Starc roared back to form with 4-33 to hand Kolkata a 24-run victory. Although Starc is nowhere close to his optimum best, Friday’s (May 3) performance showed he’s making strides towards it, with the tournament moving to its business end.

In a high-scoring season where batters have mostly called the shots, Starc assessed that the Impact Player Rule has played a part in the bowlers’ poor stats.

Speaking at the press conference after the match, Starc said: “The Impact Player rule changes things a fair bit. Everyone gets to bat a lot deeper having a batting and a bowling XI. There’s a lot made of that rule throughout the tournament and there’s been a lot of high scores, which is the nature of the wickets and the grounds we play on here. When you have batters and batting allrounders come in at Nos. 8 or 9, it’s a long batting line-up.

“There’s no fear in the powerplay when all you have to do is to clear the infield and score runs. Certainly, there has been some really good batting, don’t get me wrong, it’s not just the rules that play a part there. There’s been some fantastic scoring, some fantastic partnerships and some individual brilliance with the bat.”

Coming in to bowl the second over, Starc struck Ishan Kishan’s front pad off the first ball, but it was sliding down leg. Kishan replied with a four over extra cover, followed by a six over deep backward square leg. Starc avenged the assault by shattering Kishan’s leg stump off the fourth ball to make early inroads for Kolkata. Then he returned at the death, scalping thrice in the final over to close the game for his side.

Ishan Kishan ☝️
Tim David ☝️
Gerald Coetzee ☝️
Piyush Chawla ☝️

Mitchell Starc’s four-wicket haul helps KKR record a rare win against Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede 👏#IPL2024 pic.twitter.com/jypVKtMY0S

— Wisden (@WisdenCricket) May 3, 2024

“I haven’t changed too much,” he revealed when asked about what led to his change of fortune. “It’s about assessing conditions after the first innings. We certainly spoke about it and the batters that came off throughout that first innings mentioned the wicket and the lengths that were the hardest to face. That created the bowling plans for us.

“As T20 cricket doesn’t always go the way you want it to go, and of course I wanted to go a bit better at the start. But I am not the only bowler going for runs. It is what it is. The fact that we sit second [on the points table] and are building towards the more important games at the back end and are playing some good cricket, hopefully I can be a part of it too,” Starc added.