Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s Chennai Super Kings won their fourth Indian Premier League title on Friday with an empathic victory in the IPL 2021 final against Kolkata Knight Riders in Dubai.
The men in yellow, who finished at seventh position in the previous edition of the T20 tournament, were near the top of the points table throughout, before taking things up a notch in the playoffs.
IPL 2021 Final, CSK vs KKR as it happened: Chennai win by 27 runs to bag fourth title
As CSK win IPL 2021 for fourth title, a look at all the winners of Indian Premier League finals
The 14th edition of the IPL saw a number of fabulous individual performances from the players in the eight teams.
After CSK defeated KKR in the final, a number of awards, as is customary now, were announced to appreciate the achievements of the players through the tournament.
Here’s a look at the winners of all the major awards and the top performers across categories:
- Gamechanger of the season, Most Valuable Player of the season and Purple Cap: Harshal Patel (Royal Challengers Bangalore) for 32 wickets in 15 games, the most this season, including one five-wicket haul, and one four-wicket haul. He also picked up a hat-trick against Mumbai Indians. Patel equalled the record for most wickets in a single edition, matching Dwayne Bravo’s 32 for CSK in 2013. But for a dropped catch in the final over he bowled in the tournament, Patel would have the record all for himself.
Most wickets in IPL 2021
| PLAYER | Inns | Wkts | BBI | Avg | Econ | SR | 4w | 5w |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Harshal Patel | 15 | 32 | 5/27 | 14.34 | 8.14 | 10.56 | 1 | 1 |
| Avesh Khan | 16 | 24 | 3/13 | 18.75 | 7.37 | 15.25 | 0 | 0 |
| Jasprit Bumrah | 14 | 21 | 3/36 | 19.52 | 7.45 | 15.71 | 0 | 0 |
| Shardul Thakur | 16 | 21 | 3/28 | 25.09 | 8.80 | 17.09 | 0 | 0 |
| Mohammed Shami | 14 | 19 | 3/21 | 20.78 | 7.50 | 16.63 | 0 | 0 |
- Emerging player of the season and Orange Cap: Ruturaj Gaikwad of the Chennai Super Kings for his 635 runs, including four half centuries and one hundred. The CSK opener was one of the breakthrough stars even in a disappointing 2020 campaign and he built on it with a stunning season.
Most runs in IPL 2021
| PLAYER | Inns | NO | Runs | HS | Avg | SR | 100 | 50 | 4s | 6s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ruturaj Gaikwad | 16 | 2 | 635 | 101* | 45.35 | 136.26 | 1 | 4 | 64 | 23 |
| Faf du Plessis | 16 | 2 | 633 | 95* | 45.21 | 138.20 | 0 | 6 | 60 | 23 |
| KL Rahul | 13 | 3 | 626 | 98* | 62.60 | 138.80 | 0 | 6 | 48 | 30 |
| Shikhar Dhawan | 16 | 1 | 587 | 92 | 39.13 | 124.62 | 0 | 3 | 63 | 16 |
| Glenn Maxwell | 14 | 2 | 513 | 78 | 42.75 | 144.10 | 0 | 6 | 48 | 21 |
- Super Striker of the season: Shimron Hetmyer (Delhi Capitals) for his strike-rate of 168. The chart for this metric also showed why Mumbai Indians struggled this season as their power-hitters did not feature in the top five, as the likes of Kieron Pollard (despite one of the greatest IPL knocks of all time against CSK earlier in the season) and Hardik Pandya struggled to get going.
Best batting strike-rate in IPL 2021
| PLAYER | Inns | NO | Runs | HS | Avg | SR | 100 | 50 | 4s | 6s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shimron Hetmyer | 13 | 6 | 242 | 53* | 34.57 | 168.05 | 0 | 1 | 19 | 12 |
| Pat Cummins | 5 | 2 | 93 | 66* | 31.00 | 166.07 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 8 |
| Evin Lewis | 5 | 0 | 151 | 58 | 30.20 | 162.36 | 0 | 1 | 18 | 7 |
| Prithvi Shaw | 15 | 0 | 479 | 82 | 31.93 | 159.13 | 0 | 4 | 56 | 18 |
| Jos Buttler | 7 | 0 | 254 | 124 | 36.28 | 153.01 | 1 | 0 | 27 | 13 |
- Most Sixes in the season: KL Rahul (Punjab Kings) with 30 sixes.
Most sixes in IPL 2021
| PLAYER | Inns | NO | Runs | HS | Avg | SR | 100 | 50 | 4s | 6s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KL Rahul | 13 | 3 | 626 | 98* | 62.60 | 138.80 | 0 | 6 | 48 | 30 |
| Faf du Plessis | 16 | 2 | 633 | 95* | 45.21 | 138.20 | 0 | 6 | 60 | 23 |
| Ruturaj Gaikwad | 16 | 2 | 635 | 101* | 45.35 | 136.26 | 1 | 4 | 64 | 23 |
| Glenn Maxwell | 14 | 2 | 513 | 78 | 42.75 | 144.10 | 0 | 6 | 48 | 21 |
| Moeen Ali | 15 | 1 | 357 | 58 | 25.50 | 137.30 | 0 | 1 | 31 | 19 |
- Fairplay Award: Rajasthan Royals
- Catch of the season: Ravi Bishnoi (Punjab Kings) for taking Sunil Narine’s catch in Ahmedabad with a full length dive at deep mid-wicket.
- Power player of the season: Venkatesh Iyer (Kolkata Knight Riders)
- And finally, the fastest deliveries of the season table made for a good reading for Indian fans.
Fastest deliveries of IPL 2021
| PLAYER | Speed (km/h) |
|---|---|
| Lockie Ferguson | 153.63 |
| Umran Malik | 152.95 |
| Lockie Ferguson | 152.75 |
| Lockie Ferguson | 152.74 |
| Lockie Ferguson | 152.35 |
| Umran Malik | 152.05 |
| Umran Malik | 151.97 |
| Umran Malik | 151.77 |
| Lockie Ferguson | 151.74 |
| Lockie Ferguson | 151.72 |
Stats courtesy iplt20.com
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