'He's Got no Off Button': Tom Moody Feels Delhi Capitals Should Open With Jake Fraser-McGurk

Former Australian cricketer Tom Moody pointed out debutant Jake Fraser-McGurk’s fearless batting approach and said that he can play a pivotal role in Delhi Capitals’ race to playoffs if used properly.

McGurk came at number three against Lucknow on Friday and straightaway sent the second ball of his debut for a six over deep mid-wicket off Yash Thakur’s delivery. The second last over of the Power-play bowled by Arshad Khan cost 15 runs courtesy of a boundary and a maximum and a boundary by McGurk.

Krunal Pandya, bowling the 13th over of the innings, was taken to the cleaners by McGurk, who smashed a hat-trick of sixes to reach his half-century. McGurk became the third-youngest overseas batter after Sam Curran of England and Rahmanullah Gurbaz of Afghanistan to smash a half-century. A sliced drive at Naveen-ul-Haq ended up in the hands of a deep third, and Fraser-McGurk walked off with 55 from 35 from his debut IPL innings

Moody advised Delhi Capitals to adopt the aggressive style of playing in their race to the Playoffs and use McGurk’s batting capability wisely.

“What we saw from Fraser-McGurk tonight. You want him to face every single ball in the power play because he’s got no off button and he’ll go and go hard. Yes, there’s a lot of experience there but there’s a huge amount of upside to what he can offer and Delhi are in a position where they need to just win games of cricket, so they need to risk their game to accumulate wins,” Moody said while speaking on Star Sports.

Even after a victory against Lucknow Super Giants on Friday night, Delhi are still in the ninth position on the points table with just two wins in six games. Moody with his wealth of IPL experience emphasised on DC’s batting capability and advised them to take some bold steps.

“They can’t play conservatively and expect to play finals from where there are, you know, played six games, only won two. So they need to play a really aggressive brand of cricket, and their mindset needs to be aggressive. Therefore, their selection and the way they structure their side needs to also back that philosophy. So, for me, Fraser McGurk needs to be batting at the top of the order,” he added.