As Australia’s World Cup-winning wicketkeeper reaps the benefits of his great T20 finishing record, Matthew Wade’s next reinvention will take him back to the Indian Premier League for the first time in 11 years.
Wade has been acquired by a newly formed team, Gujarat Titans for the bid of 2 Crores and 40 lakhs.
Since his permanent slide down the order at the start of last year’s World Cup, he has only been dismissed twice in his past six T20I innings. He is in phenomenal form with an average of 67 and hammering the ball at strike rate of 165.43.
Wade had gone unsold in half a dozen IPL auctions since appearing in three games for the Delhi Daredevils. At the time, he was nurturing under Greg Shipperd in 2011. However, time has changed and we can see, there are significant parallels between his recent re-emergence as a world class match winner.
Wade is anxious to make leaps in the tournament considered as the world’s greatest domestic T20 competition. Josh Hazlewood acknowledged his IPL-winning performance with the Chennai Super Kings last year. Hazelwood, too, developed his skills rapidly to adopt the bowling environment of T20 cricket.
The 34-year-old will compete with Wriddhiman and will play under the captaincy of Hardik Pandya. Their homeground is the largest cricket stadium in the world. The Narendra Modi stadium was built recently and was inaugurated with a test match between India and England last year.
With a slew of T20 Internationals scheduled before this year’s World Cup in Australia, Inglis may be given the chance to cement his place at No. 5 in the coming months.
Despite having great claims to gain opportunities further up the order in the absence of Mitch Marsh and David Warner, Marcus Stoinis and Wade remained Australia’s designated finishers. In the recent T20 series against Sri Lanka, Wade showed his ability with both gloves in hand and as a run way match winner.
Wade’s continued strong form in a position Australia has traditionally struggled to fill means he looks set to keep the gloves for Australia’s T20 title defense later this year. He made his case even stronger by top-scoring with an unbeaten 43 off 27 balls in the home summer finale at the MCG on Sunday evening.