Tom Moody lavishes praise on KL Rahul and his quality after scoring his maiden IPL Century for Delhi Capitals.
Tom Moody lavishes praise on KL Rahul, saying he is ‘a lot better player than a lot of people give him credit for’
His strike rate in T20 cricket has drawn criticism throughout the years, and it was once again a topic of conversation on Sunday when he hit an undefeated 112 off 65 balls in a defeat to Gujarat Titans (GT). Rahul made sure the squad nearly reached 200 despite the Delhi Capitals (DC) getting off to a sluggish start, scoring only 28 for 1 in the opening five overs. However, B Sai Sudharsan and Shubman Gill easily pursued the aim and advanced GT to the playoffs, so it wasn’t enough.
On Sunday, Rahul reached his century in 60 balls, scoring 112 not out at a strike rate of 172.30. With 493 runs in 12 innings, he has been hitting at 148.04 in the 2025 Indian Premier League. He hasn’t performed better in terms of strike rate since the 2018 Indian Premier League, when he scored 659 runs in 14 games at a rate of 158.41.
Tom Moody has not taken the criticism well.
“I always find the criticism around KL Rahul quite extraordinary,” Moody said on ESPNcricinfo’s Time Out. “I think he’s a lot better player than a lot of people give him credit for. And the way I look at this innings, I think it’s an outstanding innings. And yeah, look, it’ll depend who wins the game to whether he’s, you know, the Player of the Match or not. But the way I look at this and I look at the batting card, what’s let them down and not reaching that 220 is the other batters that were in only struck at 150. On a [batting-friendly] surface, you want impact.
“When you’ve got someone in there that’s anchoring, that’s building the total, your role when you come in is to impact the game – 30 off ten balls, those types of innings, that suddenly take you to that 220. Instead of pointing the finger at the same person, I think it’s the other way around.”
Rahul was on 56 after 38 balls as DC finished ten overs at 81 for 1. However, Rahul only had to face six balls between 15 and 18, with Tristan Stubbs and Axar Patel at the other end taking more of the bowling. Moody thought that this caused him to lose some of his momentum.
“The team had the opportunity to get it to 220. The team didn’t do that,” Moody said. “This is not an individual sport. This is a team sport. And that’s where the communication around who’s coming in and the communication when you’re out there: ‘okay, we need to target two boundaries at the beginning of this over; let’s make this a big over’, that type of conversations.
“To me, they just lay idle a little bit in that middle [period]. And also, we’ve got to recognise KL Rahul, I believe, only faced four [six] balls in a period of four overs in the middle of that. So therefore, you know, he lost a bit of his rhythm as well.”