Delhi Daredevils (DD) | IPL 2018

Delhi Daredevils (DD) | IPL 2018

The Delhi Daredevils (DD) is a franchise cricket team representing the city of Delhi in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Founded in 2008 one of the eight founding teams of the IPL, the Delhi franchise is owned by the GMR Group. Their home grounds are the Feroz Shah Kotla Ground in Delhi and the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Cricket Stadium in Chhattisgarh. qualified for Champions League T20 twice, making the Finals in the 2012 edition. However, in recent seasons, the team has a strong attack, often ending up as wooden spooners. They appointed the Australian legend Ricky Ponting as their Head Coach on 4 January 2018.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2009 season:

The Daredevils dominated for much of the 2009 IPL under the captaincy of Gautam Gambhir finishing at the top of the table. The likes of Sehwag and Gambhir both had developed greatly since the last season and set up many large totals for the Daredevils, with AB de Villiers hitting one of only two centuries in the 2009 IPL, which was held in South Africa. The Daredevils consisted of new and uncapped players like Aaron Finch and Glenn Maxwell, who went on to become very great names in T20 circuits. Delhi were table toppers again in 2012. Morne Morkel of Delhi was the highest wicket taker of the tournament. The Daredevils came third in the tournament and qualified for the second time in the Champions League Twenty20.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2012 season:

In the IPL season of 2012, a new Delhi Daredevils side was seen after a poor 2011 season where they finished last. They came back strongly having purchased players the likes of Kevin Pietersen, Mahela Jayawardene and Ross Taylor.They stood first in the Pool Table with the Kolkata Knight Riders at second place, Mumbai Indians coming third and the Chennai Super Kings securing the fourth spot, consequently also qualifying for the Champions League Twenty20 in 2012 held in South Africa.

Mahela Jayawardane was appointed as the new captain of the Delhi Daredevils after Virender Sehwag stepped down from captaincy during the 2012 season of the Champions League Twenty20.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2013 season:

The Delhi Daredevils lost all first six matches of IPL 2013 and won their first match in 7 games against the Mumbai Indians. Virender Sehwag and Mahela Jayawardene’s partnership led to an inevitable win against the Mumbai Indians in which they scored 161 runs. Sehwag was the Man of the Match for his brilliant innings of 95* off 57 balls. After this match, they faced Kings XI Punjab and lost again. But in their 9th match of the season, against Pune Warriors India, they won, putting them in 8th place in the points table. They defeated Kolkata Knight Riders in their 10th Match by 7 wickets but failed to advance to 7th place due to their net run-rate. In their next match against the Sunrisers Hyderabad, Delhi Daredevils were bowled out for just 80, which was the lowest total in Delhi’s IPL record, giving the Sunrisers a comfortable win. In their match against Rajasthan Royals, they scored 154 thanks to new recruit Ben Rohrer’s brilliant half-century, however that effort was in vain as Rajasthan chased the total down easily with only 1 wicket falling. This loss for the Daredevils officially eliminated them from the 2013 season.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2014 season:

Ahead of the IPL 2014 auction, on 10 January 2014, the Delhi Daredevils announced that they will not retain any players from their current squad for season 7. With no players retained, the team would have the most ‘right-to-match’ cards among all the franchises at the auction: i.e., three. They will also have their full purse of Rs 600 million (approx US$9.6) to spend at the auction. The Delhi Daredevils experienced another poor season in 2014. They lost their first match, against Royal Challengers Bangalore, however they won their next match against Kolkata Knight Riders. This was followed by a heavy loss against the Chennai Super Kings and a nail-bitingly close match which resulted in a disappointing loss against Sunrisers Hyderabad. Delhi Daredevils won their next match against the Mumbai Indians having restricted Mumbai to 125. Later, when the tournament shifted from the United Arab Emirates to India, Delhi lost their next nine matches. The Delhi Daredevils won only two out of their 14 matches, both of which took place in the UAE.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2015 season:

The team finished 7th in the 2015 edition of the IPL. They received fierce criticism from the Delhi fans because of their string of poor performances in the past two years.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2016 season:

The Delhi Daredevils released many of its players, including last year’s most expensive purchase, Yuvraj Singh, whom they had bought for a Rs 16 crores. The Daredevils also released former Sri Lankan skipper and all-rounder Angelo Mathews who was bought for Rs 7.5 crores. Sanju Samson and Karun Nair, who previously played for the Rajasthan Royals were also bought for hefty amounts. South African all-rounder Chris Morris was bought for Rs 7 crores. After the Daredevils ended their association with South African Gary Kirsten, they appointed Paddy Upton as their head coach. The Indian batting legend and head coach of India U-19, Rahul Dravid was appointed the batting mentor of the Daredevils. Zaheer Khan was appointed as the new captain of the Delhi Daredevils in 2016 IPL season. After losing their first match against the Kolkata Knight Riders, they went on to dominate Kings XI Punjab, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Mumbai Indians, Kolkata Knight Riders in the second leg and Gujarat Lions. They won 5 of their first 7 matches. They lost their second match against Gujarat Lions by just one run. Delhi were favorites to qualify for the playoffs. However, they could manage only two wins against Sunrisers Hyderabad and finished with 14 points in 14 games, putting them in 6th place.

Delhi Daredevils – IPL 2017 season:

Delhi lost their main players, De Kock and Duminy before the tournament. This made them dependent on a very young batting line up. But they had the most powerful bowling line up with Zaheer Khan, Mohammed Shami, Chris Morris, Pat Cummins, Kagiso Rabada, Amit Mishra, Shahbaz Nadeem, Jayant Yadav, etc. But they lost to RCB in the first game and won by big margins against RPS and KXIP. After this, they lost 5 games in a row. Samson got the first century of the season. However, they bounced back by chasing 189 and 214 against SRH and GL respectively.