IPL 2024: England pacer David Willey has made himself unavailable for the start of the Tata Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024, his franchise – Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) confirmed on Wednesday. The English left-arm seamer has cited personal reasons for his unavailability.
Notably, Willey, who has been on the roll for the last two months due to his participation in various T20 leagues across the globe, has informed his franchise about his decision. LSG hasn’t named any replacement so far, which means that the seamer may join the KL Rahul-led side anytime midway through the tournament, which begins on March 22 in Chennai.
David Willey was part of the Abu Dhabi Knight Riders squad in ILT20 and Multan Sultan in the PSL 2024. The pacer has returned home after playing for Multan in the PSL 2024 final, where his side couldn’t finish on top and lost to Islamabad United in the marquee clash.
The left-arm pacer is the second Englishman after Mark Wood, who has pulled out of the Tata IPL 2024 for Lucknow Super Giants (LSG). Earlier, Mark Wood cited “workload management” as the reason to pull out of the cash-rich Indian T20 league.
Subsequently, LSG roped in West Indies pacer Shamar Joseph as the replacement for Mark Wood.
Justin Langer, who will have his maiden stint in the IPL, admitted that his team’s pace battery has been weekend due to the absence of the two notable English pacers. However, the former Australian coach reckons that the side has enormous talent and the coach banks on them to perform impressively in the seventeenth season of the IPL.
IPL 2024 – David Willey, Wood’s absence huge loss for LSG: Langer
“With Mark Wood pulling out of the tournament and also David Willey won’t be coming now either, that means we lack some experience,” Langer said, when asked about LSG’s pace attack. “But what I’ve also seen in the last couple of days is that we have enormous talent. Some of our guys have had some injuries but they all look very fit at the moment.”
“They look fit and healthy and they’re very hungry, so we’ll just have to manage them well so that we can get them through and work through the whole tournament, not just the start of the tournament. We’ve got one overseas player up our sleeve if required, where we might be able to add some experience.”
Langer was full of praise for young Mayank Yadav, who is quite impressive with his raw pace. He indicated replacing Wood with the likes of Shamar Joseph and Mayank Yadav, who possess similar traits.
“We also have Shamar Joseph, we have Mayank who bowls with very good pace. Hopefully, we can replace, not [Wood’s] experience, but his pace with Shamar Joseph and Mayank. He’ll be missed – of course, he’ll be missed, he’s a world-class bowler – but this is the world we live in and we will adapt and we will be okay,” he added.
Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) will play its opening game against Rajasthan Royals (RR) on March 24. The two sides will clash at the Sawai Man Singh Stadium in Jaipur in Sunday’s afternoon fixture.