A thumb injury had ruled Devon Conway out of IPL 2024 at least until April. To fill the gap at the top, Chennai Super Kings had used Rachin Ravindra as captain Ruturaj Gaikwad’s opening partner. In their last game, against the Mumbai Indians, Ajinkya Rahane had opened batting.

According to a recent press release on April 18, Conway has now been ruled out of the entire season. For CSK, he had amassed 924 runs across 2022 and 2023, while striking at 141. With 672 runs at 140, he was instrumental to their fifth title triumph in 2023.

As Conway’s replacement, Chennai signed up fast-medium bowler Richard Gleeson for his base price of INR 50 lakh. From six T20Is for England, all of them in 2022, he has picked up nine wickets at 20.77 while going at 8.90 an over. He was also a reserve for the England squad at the T20 World Cup.

Gleeson is a familiar face in India: on his debut, he dismissed Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, and Rishabh Pant inside his first eight balls to finish with 3-15. In his second game, he got Ravindra Jadeja, soon to be his teammate at CSK.

A roving cricketers across franchise leagues around the world, the 36-year-old Gleeson has played in the Blast and The Hundred at home as well as in the BBL, PSL, BPL, SA20, ILT20, and the Abu Dhabi T10. In all T20 cricket, he has 101 wickets from 90 matches at 24.32 with an economy rate of 8.18.

With eight points from six games and a net run rate of +0.726, the Super Kings are now third on the points table in IPL 2024, behind only Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata Knight Riders. They next play the Lucknow Super Giants on April 19.