Dinesh Karthik at IPL: six franchises, second-most capped, and death-overs dasher
Since his IPL debut in 2008, Karthik has missed only two games, and scored 1000-plus runs for two teams
Sampath Bandarupalli23-May-2024257 Dinesh Karthik retires from the IPL as the second-most capped player of the league, alongside Rohit Sharma with 257 appearances, and only behind MS Dhoni’s 264.2 Karthik is the second-most prolific wicketkeeper in the history of the IPL with 174 dismissals, behind Dhoni’s 190. Karthik has 137 catches and 37 stumpings in the IPL with the gloves, both behind Dhoni’s 148 catches and 42 stumpings.4097 Runs by Karthik while batting at No. 4 or lower in the IPL are the second-most behind Dhoni’s 5047. Karthik batted at No. 4 or lower in 204 innings, and at No. 3 on 30 occasions but never opened the batting.1565 Runs scored by Karthik during the death overs (17-20) in the IPL. Only Dhoni (2786) and Kieron Pollard (1708) have scored more runs during this phase in the IPL. Karthik scored those runs at a strike rate of 186.97, and hit 91 sixes across the 837 balls faced.
195.77 Karthik’s strike rate in death overs in the IPL since the start of 2018. It is the fourth-highest strike rate among the 16 batters to have faced 250-plus balls during this phase.4842 Runs scored by Karthik in his IPL career puts him tenth in the list of leading run-getters in the league. He scored 4463 runs as a wicketkeeper in 236 matches, the second-most behind Dhoni’s 5125 runs in 258 games.187 Players have played alongside Karthik across the 257 IPL matches, by far the most for anyone. Ajinkya Rahane is next on the list with 168 team-mates in the IPL, while Shikhar Dhawan played alongside 167.6 Number of franchises Karthik represented in the IPL – Delhi Daredevils (now Delhi Capitals), Kings XI Punjab (now Punjab Kings), Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, Gujarat Lions and Kolkata Knight Riders. He scored half-centuries for all those six franchises, a feat achieved by only Yuvraj Singh.2 Franchises for which Karthik had 1000-plus runs in the IPL: 1143 for KKR, and 1036 for DC. But he fell short of that milestone for RCB, finishing his career with 937 runs.2 Number of IPL matches missed by Karthik played by his franchises in the 17 seasons. DD left him out of the playing XI during an away fixture against KKR in 2008. Karthik next missed out on RCB’s away fixture against Sunrisers Hyderabad only in 2023, when he was supposed to be the impact player in the chase but wasn’t required as they won by eight wickets.
233 Matches played by Karthik for his franchises in the IPL between the two he missed. It is the longest streak for any player without missing a match for his respective franchises in the IPL. Rohit has the next-best streak with 165 consecutive matches between 2009 and 2019.99.23 Percentage of team matches played by Karthik in the IPL. It is the second highest for any player to have featured in 100-plus matches for their franchises since their debut season. Rashid Khan has a 100% record, having featured in all 121 games of his teams since his IPL debut in 2017.