Anshul Kamboj’s rise in IPL 2026 has come quickly but not by chance. Released by Mumbai Indians after a quiet 2024, he found a more defined role with Chennai Super Kings last year, taking eight wickets in eight matches. This season, the Haryana seamer sits alongside Bhuvneshwar Kumar at 17 wickets in the Purple Cap race, conceding only a shade more per over. For Ambati Rayudu, who played with Kamboj at CSK, that versatility is the difference.
“I think his capability of bowling in the powerplay, in the middle, as well as in the death – when you can do these three, I think you are among the top-five bowlers who have ever played IPL, because most of them can’t do all three,” Rayudu told ESPNcricinfo’s TimeOut after Kamboj’s 3 for 32 against MI on Saturday night. “We can name people on our fingers who can do these three things and do them brilliantly. His death bowling has improved quite a bit and especially that angle from around the stumps and his nailing of those yorkers, it’s quite impressive. It’s not an easy thing to do.”
The around-the-wicket tactic is hardly novel in the Super Kings system. Dwayne Bravo employed it, Eric Simons continues to coach it, and the franchise’s sister teams use the same blueprint overseas. Yet Kamboj has adopted it with unusual discipline.
“You can put that down to the old CSK blueprint, when you had [Dwayne] Bravo and obviously Eric Simons [the bowling coach] is still there. They really like guys to come around the wicket,” Mitchell McClenaghan, the former New Zealand and MI left-arm quick, explained. “The point I’m trying to make is that probably, previous to coming to CSK, I don’t think he had a real plan or idea of what he wanted to do at the death. And so I think he’s found something.
“Yes, it may not be successful all the time in all conditions. You definitely need a bigger side [of the ground] and you need to know that your field is on the off side. But I think that he’s found a plan that works for him. He can execute it and it’s making him very effective, turns [him] into that three-phase bowler.”
McClenaghan also highlighted Kamboj’s length control rather than out-and-out speed.
“What I like the most about him, and about the guys who have been successful in this IPL so far, [is that] they have got the highest percentage of being able to hit that six-to-eight-metre length with the new ball and he does that,” he said. “You’ve got Josh Hazlewood, you’ve got [Mohammed] Siraj, you’ve got [Kagiso] Rabada, you’ve got Bhuvi [Bhuvneshwar], and Kamboj is in that bracket as well. And you can see that late little seam movement either way, which is very difficult to be able to deal with at the top.”
Those late-seam deliveries have disguised the fact that Kamboj is still working on variations. Rayudu, ever direct, believes there is another gear to find. “still needs to improve his slower ball”, he had remarked earlier in the tournament, a reminder that the bowler remains a work in progress.
A hit-the-deck operator from Karnal, the 25-year-old first drew attention when he took all ten wickets in a Ranji Trophy innings back in Novembe
