Piyush Chawla Leapfrogs Harbhajan Singh To Become The 3rd Highest Wicket-Taker In IPL History

Piyush Chawla made his debut for the Chennai Super Kings in the ongoing IPL opener and in his very first over the vile leg-spinner displayed why he is such a successful bowler in the cash-rich league in the past 12 years.

Chawla came in at a time when Mumbai Indians, courtesy their opening duo of Rohit Sharma and Quinton de Kock, had got off to a whirlwind start. With Rohit and De Kock smoking 45 runs off Deepak Chahar, Sam Curran, and Lungi Ngidi in the first four overs, skipper MS Dhoni turned to his trump card in Piyush Chawla, and the move paid dividends immediately.

PIYUSH CHAWLA — CSK's newest import draws first blood

Rohit Sharma c Sam Curran b Chawla 12(10)

Most dismissals vs leg spin since IPL 2017 (right handers)
9 Rohit Sharma
8 AB de Villiers/ Robin Uthappa#MI: 46/1 (4.4 overs) .. https://t.co/dsqWCCIYSi #IPL2020 #MIvCSK pic.twitter.com/L5EaEffUZg

— Cricbuzz (@cricbuzz) September 19, 2020

Chawla went on to dismiss the dangerous-looking Rohit Sharma when the latter mistimes a lofted drive to give an easy catch to mid-off. In that process, Piyush Chawla went on to leapfrog veteran spinner Harbhajan Singh to become the third-highest wicket-taker in the history of the IPL.

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Piyush Chawla makes his presence felt in the IPL opener

The veteran leg-spinner has now claimed 151 IPL wickets in 158 matches at an average of 27.11 and a strike-rate of 20.85 and has only Lasith Malinga [170] and Amit Mishra [157] ahead of him as far as most wickets in the history of the T20 league is concerned. Chawla, even though he ended up just one wicket, was the pick of the Chennai Super Kings bowler as he gave control to MSD in the middle-overs, giving just 21 runs in his four overs.

CSK came back brilliantly in the second half of the Mumbai Indians innings thanks to a bit of magic in the field by Faf du Plessis, who claimed back-t0-back stunners at the boundary to derail MI’s charge, paving way for a collapse that saw them lose them manage just 41 runs in the last over at the cost of six wickets. CSK will now be needing 163 to win the opening game and snap their five-match losing streak against MI.