Delhi Capitals captain Axar Patel is primarily a spinner who can also bat. However, the southpaw has concentrated on his batting more than bowling in the Indian Premier League 2025. He didn’t bowl four overs in a match before the recent clash against Lucknow Super Giants. Although he didn’t pick up a wicket, he conceded just 29 runs. He kept things tight when Aiden Markram and Mitchell Marsh were going strong.
Axar bowled the first, third, fifth, and seventh overs of the innings, and it was after a long time that a spinner survived an onslaught by the batters in the powerplay overs. Markram and Marsh couldn’t hit him despite the field restriction, and Axar completed one of the finest spells in the 18th season.
Former India player Anjum Chopra was surprised that Axar hadn’t done a similar job with the ball in the previous games, and when she questioned the player about the reason, it was revealed that he was carrying an injury.
Axar was carrying a hand injury from the ICC Champions Trophy 2025, and he wanted to recover from it before bowling his full quota of overs in the ongoing edition of the league. He suffered a cut on his index finger during the global tournament.
“We bowled well in the powerplay overs and despite Lucknow not losing a wicket, we were in the game. I told my boys that we have a chance to take wickets. Despite conceding 85 runs without a wicket, we managed to restrict them to 160, which was a good effort,” he said.
“I was not bowling to my best as I was carrying an injury. If I had bowled the full quota of four overs, I could have missed matches in the first half of the tournament. This was the reason I was hiding but came out today after recovering from the injury concern,” he added.
“The rhythm was good and I felt it from the start of my bowling and thought of completing four overs,” he concluded.