IPL 2024: What is the new bouncers rule and what is its impact?

The Indian Premier League got off to flying start on Friday as defending champions Chennai Super Kings eased past Royal Challengers Bengaluru, offering teams and fans a lot to think about over the coming weeks.

Chennai were expected to prevail at their home ground – the MA Chidambaram Stadium – as their squad is built around optimising the slow nature of wicket there. However, on Friday, Chennai found the going tough for a significant period and were lucky to emerge from it unscathed.

Batting first, Bangalore made a strong start before losing their entire top order to Bangladesh left-arm quick Mustafizur Rahman. At 78-5, the writing was on the wall. Wicketkeeper Anuj Rawat (48) and Dinesh Karthik (38) weathered the storm and plundered boundaries at the end to take the total to 173-6, which did pose a few problems for Chennai.

One particular passage showed this IPL is going to be a lot different than previous seasons. This time, fast bowlers have been allowed to bowl two bouncers per over, instead of the one.

That means pacers can bowl short almost the entire over, which will force the power hitters to access other sides of the ground and not just plant their foot down and swing across the line.

The new changes were highlighted during Chennai's chase. Royal Challengers pacers Cameroon Green and Alzarri Joseph went for the short ball straight away, drastically reducing the number of areas Super Kings batsmen could access.

Anticipates well