The 2024 Indian Premier League season has seen a flurry of high-scoring games with both the run-rate and strike-rate rising quite rapidly in the Powerplay and even at the half-way mark. Top-order batters like Quinton de Kock have been making the matches more interesting with their big hitting on almost all turfs across India.

If the run rate in the powerplay in the 2020 season was 7.71, it’s now 9.2, beating last year’s mark of 8.71. The strike rate has also gone up to 143 in contrast to 137 last season and the run rate has now reached 8.89 in contrast to 7.6 in the 2020 edition of the cash-rich league in the first 10 overs.

“I like big hitting and it’s a mandatory thing for all the top order batters as a good start allows the side to post a big score on the board,” de Kock told HT. "It’s always a pressure game for top-order batters as they have got the responsibility to give a good start to the side.”

In fact, the change in the perspective of the top-order batters in the IPL, was first seen in the 2023 edition when the run rate in the first six overs, which remained below eight for almost three seasons, jumped over nine.