Mumbai Indians' (MI) Director of Cricket Operations, Zaheer Khan is keeping an eye on the progress of the tournament with dew becoming a factor in the outcome of the IPL 2021 matches.
Recently, Chennai Super Kings captain MS Dhoni and Sunrisers Hyderabad skipper David Warner talked about dew after the defeat in their respective matches. Zaheer's comment comes after the two captains' post-match statements.
"If there is a dew factor, then we have to wait and see how the tournament shapes up. As we play more and more games, whether it is actually becoming a factor in terms of an advantage to one team, we have to wait for that," said Zaheer during a virtual press conference.
Warner had said the bowlers found it difficult to bowl in the right areas with the dew factor after KKR won the match by 10 runs. "The dew made a difference. If the bowlers overpitched, it was easy to hit it, and with the height in their team, and with the cross-seam, it stopped a little bit on us."
Dhoni pointed out that the 30 minutes early start at 7:30 PM IST is giving an advantage to the team batting second. He said it gets easy to chase with dew sets in.
"Especially when you have dew in your mind and you are batting first, you want to get those extra 10-15 runs -- that was normally in 8 pm start games. Now the 7.30 start means the opposition will have at least half an hour when there will be very little amount of dew on the field, which means it will not come on as nicely as it will in the second innings.
"So you have to score those 15-20 extra runs to make it even, and after that also you have to get early wickets to make a big mark on the game," said Dhoni.
(With ANI Inputs)
