Ajinkya Rahane Traded to Delhi Capitals In Exchange For Mayank Markande, Rahul Tewatia

The former Rajasthan Royals captain Ajinkya Rahane has been traded to Delhi Capitals in exchange for two leg spinners Mayank Markande and Rahul Tewatia.

Rahane has represented Rajasthan Royals in more than 100 matches. Last season, he scored 393 runs in 14 matches at an average of 32.75 including 1 hundred and 1 fifty.

He started off the season as a captain, but was sacked in the middle of the season in favour of Steve Smith.

It’s quite surprising that the Delhi Capitals have opted for Rahane because they already have quite a few opening batsmen in their ranks.

Apart from Shikhar Dhawan and Colin Munro, two prominent international players, they also have two young openers in Prithvi Shaw and Manjot Kalra and now they have gone for Rahane who will be the 5th opener in the squad.

It will be interesting to see how they find room for Rahane in the playing XI. Rahane generally bats at the top of the order in white ball cricket.

Mayank Markande’s case is also quite interesting. He was actually traded from Mumbai Indians to Delhi Capitals initially and now, he has been traded to the Rajasthan Royals. It’s the first time that a player has been traded twice in the middle of a transfer window.

Delhi already had a leg spinning trio of Sandeep Lamichhane, Amit Mishra and Rahul Tewatia when they roped in Markande. It was hard to understand that decision in the first place because they didn’t require a leg spinner at that time.

Markande didn’t have a great IPL earlier this year. It was Rahul Chahar who was preferred ahead of him in the Mumbai Indians’ playing XI. But, Markande’s performance in IPL 2018 was really good.

As far as Markande’s overall IPL stats are concerned, the 22-year old has so far played 17 IPL games in his career and has taken 16 wickets. His economy rate is a bit on the higher side, but he is a wicket-taking bowler.

 

 

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