IPL 2016: Who won the battle - Indians or Foreigners?

Bowlers

While Mitchell McClenaghan was leading the table in the first half, it was Bhuvneshwar Kumar who came back strongly & became the leading wicket-taker this time. The Indian pacer who lost his rhythm for a while is back now with more speed and swing. Take a look at the table of most wickets in IPL 2016:

Most Wickets In IPL 2016

Bowler	Wickets	Matches	Economy
Bhuvneshwar Kumar	23	17	7.42
Yuzvendra Chahal	21	13	8.15
Shane Watson	20	16	8.58
Dhawal Kulkarni	18	14	7.42
Mustafizur Rahman	17	16	6.90
Mitchell McClenaghan	17	14	8.17

While Bhuvneshwar Kumar won the purple cap in the season, the young leggie Yuzvendra Chahal too impressed everyone. Because of his performance, he was even selected in the team for the Zimbabwe tour.

If we look at the economy rates of the bowlers, Indian bowlers again have an edge over the foreigners. Bhuvi was not only the pick of the bowlers but he also bowled with an economy of 7.42.

The stats always say something! No doubt, the top Indian bowlers of the tournament have done really well but it’s important to look at the number of overs bowlers (Indians & Overseas) bowled in the tournament. It will give us a clear picture.

Bowlers	Number Of Overs	Wickets	Average
Indians	1410.4 overs	339 Wickets	4.16 wicket per match
Overseas	842.3 overs	252 Wickets	3.34 wicket per match

By the stats, one will say that Indians have an edge over the overseas players in average wickets but we cannot forget that one can team can play with only 4 overseas players maximum. According to that, the overseas players had a very good average.

On the other side, the bowlers too enjoyed a lot in all the editions. Here also, the battle is interesting as 50 Indians are in the top 10 list from the beginning of the IPL. While 40 Overseas players made a cut to the list. Have a look at them in the table:

Battle of 9 years (Number of Bowlers in top 10 from Season 1)

Year	Indians	Overseas
2008	5	5
2009	7	3
2010	6	4
2011	6	4
2012	5	5
2013	4	6
2014	7	3
2015	5	5
2016	5	5
Total	50	40

Now, taking 3 wickets and spending 50 runs in IPL can’t be a good performance! But spending 16 runs in 4 overs with an economy of 4 is a champion example of T20 bowling. This year the table can surprise you! Have a look!

Bowler	Economy Rate
Sachin Baby (Bowled in only 2 innings)	4.79
Mitchell Marsh (Bowled in only 3 innings)	5.00
Yusuf Pathan (Bowled in only 4 innings)	5.50
John Hastings (Bowled in only 2 innings)	5.55
Chris Gayle (Bowled in only 4 innings)	6.30
Adam Zampa	6.76
Mustafizur Rahman	6.90
Chris Morris	7.00
Sunil Narine	7.09
Vinay Kumar (Bowled in only 3 innings)	7.11

We cannot say Sachin Baby was the best bowler of the season as he only bowled in 2 innings. Similarly, with Mitchell Marsh, John Hastings, Yusuf Pathan and Chris Gayle as they didn’t bowl much. Zampa & Mustafizur really impressed everyone in this season. Economically, here, overseas are better than Indians.

Clearly, Indians ruled over the overseas players in IPL but the outsiders were good in all the departments keeping in mind that only 4 are allowed per side during the match. Another good news for all the cricket fans is that they will get to see much more younger talent in the near future.