Up until Tuesday's playoff game in Chennai, Suryakumar Yadav found himself pushed out of a comfort zone he had carved in 2018 - his best year in the IPL. In the auctions before that season, Mumbai Indians wrestled off two serious suitors for the Mumbai batsman - one, his former employers KKR - to nab him for INR 3.20 Crore.
IPL 2019
Suryakumar turns protagonist as MI ace the CSK blueprint
Suryakumar Yadav made unbeaten 71 on a tough track in Chennai to carry the side to the final. © BCCI
They then put him on an even higher pedestal, allowing him the batting freedom that comes with opening the innings. After four sub-200 seasons, Suryakumar suddenly catapulted to one with 512 runs and made that opening slot at the three-time champions his own. Or so he would've thought.
An IPL right before the 50-over World Cup prompted Rohit Sharma to mirror his Indian team batting position at the franchise level. This decision nudged Suryakumar down only by one spot - and sometimes two - but even then the difference was telling.
Suryakumar scored 363 runs in the 14 league stage games, a far cry from his last season's tally. His only fifty came when he began batting with more than half the PowerPlay still to go - a luxury afforded to him just twice out of the eight times he got to bat in the first six overs.
But that inconvenience, so to say, was only until late evening on Tuesday when Rohit Sharma perished to a Deepak Chahar's outswinger on
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