On the day of his possible IPL debut with the Chennai Super Kings, latest Zealand allrounder Daryl Mitchell was announced as the Texas Super Kings’ latest foreign signing for MLC 2024. Mitchell will travel to the United States with Mitchell Santner and Devon Conway, both from New Zealand and CSK.
MI New York, the defending champions, have signed West Indies allrounder Romario Shepherd, who is set to make his IPL debut for the Mumbai Indians in 2024, and South African fast bowler Anrich Nortje. Shepherd, who improved his all-round game after winning the CPL 2023 with Guyana Amazon Warriors, will rejoin with his first West Indies captain and Mumbai Indians batting coach Kieron Pollard at MI NY. Trent Boult, Tim David, and Kagiso Rabada are all part of MI NY’s strong overseas core.
Michael Bracewell, a New Zealand spin-bowling allrounder who has struggled with injuries over the last year, joined the Seattle Orcas, while Australia batter Matt Short joined the San Francisco Unicorns. Bracewell will rejoin his former Wellington Firebirds teammate Finn Allen at Unicorns.
In MLC 2023, Orcas lacked an offspinner to counter left-handers. They have addressed this by signing Bracewell, who scored a career-high 8 for 41 in the four-day Plunket Shield earlier this week.
Stephen Fleming, the Super Kings’ head coach, originally worked with Mitchell while he was on New Zealand’s coaching staff in preparation for the 2023 ODI World Cup in India. Mitchell dominated spin during the event, prompting CSK to spend INR 14 crore on him.
“I’m really excited to be part of the Texas Super Kings and to get to yellove again and be part of the CSK family,” Mitchell told Super Kings’ social-media channels. “I think the cool thing about the MLC following the World Cup being in the West Indies and the America [is] the conditions should be pretty similar and hopefully we continue to adapt to the different conditions and get stuck in.”
Shepherd, who has now added a Dwayne Bravo-esque slower dipper to his repertoire, will shore up MI NY’s death bowling. In the domestic draft, Super Kings snapped up Raj Nannan and Josh Tromp, the twin brother of Matthew Tromp, who was drafted by Los Angeles Knight Riders. CSK have also added some USA flavour to their IPL squad by bringing in dart-it-in mystery spinner Anirudh Immanuel as a net bowler. The 19-year-old has played for the Philadelphians in Minor League Cricket in the USA.
Jahmar Hamilton, a West Indies wicketkeeper-batsman, was the 16th pick in the Unicorns draft. Former Pakistan international Hammad Azam, who played for the Knight Riders in their initial season, was selected by Orcas in the recent draft.
Adithya Ganesh, a former Tamil Nadu wicketkeeper-batsman who just moved to the United States, was the first pick in the domestic draft and will play for the Knight Riders. Ganesh, 32, was Tamil Nadu’s reserve wicketkeeper-batsman when the team won the 20-overs Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy in 2021 under Vijay Shankar. Ganesh is a good spinner who previously operated as a middle-order floater for R Ashwin’s Dindigul Dragons in the Tamil Nadu Premier League (TNPL). Ganesh’s experience and exposure to Indian conditions were important factors in his selection, according to Ryan ten Doeschate, the Knight Riders’ assistant coach who is now in the IPL.
“Our thinking was it was most important to cover the starting XI, and we didn’t want to take any risks,” Ten Doeschate told MLC network.” We did a lot of research on Adithya; he is someone who has played in India quite a bit. So, we were pretty determined to get him and then sort of make up where we need to further along the line. Adithya seemed the best out of the bunch with our research and what we think we need this year.”
