Shreyas Gopal

Shreyas Gopal is a wily leg spinner and an explosive lower-order batsman from Karnataka. Gopal emerged as a compact batsman but it was his leg-break bowling that took him places. The leg-spinner is someone who spins the ball squares and believes to deceive the batters in flight. He made his first-class debut in the 2013-14 season and proved to be a crucial hand for Karnataka’s triumph in that Ranji season. And his all-round abilities earned him an IPL contract in the IPL 2014 but it wasn’t until the move to Rajasthan in 2018 that made Goyal who he is. 

Born in Bangalore, a middle-order batter named Gopal came through Karnataka’s age-group level. He was destined to play cricket but his turnaround from a batting all-rounder to a leg spinning all-rounder happened in 2014. In his debut Ranji season, Gopal failed with the bat but amassed 22 wickets that helped Karnataka win the final glory, and followed it up with a hat-trick against the Rest of India in the Irani Cup. His success was caught by Mumbai Indians’ scouts and the Karnataka-based allrounder was bagged for INR 10 lakh in the 2014 IPL auction. 

For MI, he could play only six matches for the franchise spread across three IPL seasons. However, he migrated to Rajasthan Royals before the IPL 2018 to club some success in the richest cricketing league. The leggie took 11 wickets in his first season for the Royals, including a best of 4-16 against Royal Challengers Bangalore. He bettered the wonders in the 2019 season when he picked 20 wickets from 14 matches at an economy rate of 7.22 runs per over. He also garnered headlines last season when he took a hat-trick against RCB that included wickets of Virat Kohli and AB De Villiers. 

However, the same that happens with every other player in a league IPL happened with Gopal too. After two fabulous stints with Rajasthan, his performance saw a serious dip in the third stint. The spinner played all 14 games and took 10 wickets at a horrendous average over 42. As a result, Gopal was benched, most often than not, in the 2021 IPL season. 

With competition with Krishappa Gowtham and Jagadeesha Suchith in Karnataka, and Yuzvendra Chahal and Rahul Chahar at the top level, Gopal is facing a lot of challenges in taking the jump to the next level. There is no denying his skill levels but Gopal has a lot of competitors between him and his dream to play for India. 

(As of June 2021)