RCB Bold Diaries: He’s a really calm character: Mike Hesson praises Shahbaz Ahmed

While the RCB middle order has consistently fired on all cylinders throughout the first 6 games of the tournament, there has been plenty of talk around Dinesh Karthik and his resurgence in the finisher’s role. However, there has been another man who has gone about his business without much of a fuss, while his efforts have been equally as crucial.

He has come out to bat 4 times and on all 4 occasions had a huge impact on the game. Shahbaz Ahmed has come of age in IPL 2022 for RCB and how. Director of Cricket Operations, Mike Hesson spoke about the emergence of Shahbaz as a solid middle-order player, saying, “He’s just a calming influence. He’s only really in his first full season playing, but he’s gone out there and looks a senior pro in terms of being able to maneuver the ball, gets an early boundary away just to release the pressure, puts the field back off and then he can feed the strike to the guys hitting. We know he’s got power, so at the back end, he chooses the right time to do it. He’s a really calm character for someone who hasn’t played too many games.”

Over the last couple of games, Shahbaz has had to take up the burden of fulfilling the quota of the fifth bowler along with Glenn Maxwell. While his first over went for 15 runs, bowling in the powerplay to David Warner who was on the charge, he came back to bowl a tight second over, conceding only 4 singles. Speaking of his bowling ability, “With the ball today I think he was exceptional. Obviously bowling with such a short boundary, to be able to block off parts of the park, really influential performance,” gushed Mike Hesson.