Old ball or dry ball: The death-over dilemma for captains

This IPL season has brought in two rule changes that are meant to help bowlers. But they've ended up creating a tricky choice for the captains.

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One brings back the use of saliva to shine the ball and use reverse swing. The other rule allows the fielding captain to replace the ball with one of "similar wear and tear" after the 10th over in the second innings of a night game, even in the absence of visible dew. In effect, teams can now swap a soft and/or damp ball for a harder and drier one.

While both the rules were introduced to balance the skewed bat-ball dynamic, they can be at odds with each other in practice. If you've worked on the ball all innings to get it to reverse, do you stick with it? Or do you opt for another one that might buy your spinner more grip and turn in the final 10 overs of the match?

The conundrum came into play in Match #5 between Punjab Kings and Gujarat Titans. Shreyas Iyer chose not to change the ball and the plan to bowl wide yorkers from over-thewicket to Sherfane Rutherford bore fruit. "Arshdeep played an important role in that (the wide yorker plan),' Shreyas revealed after the match.

"He came in and said the ball is actually reversing a bit, so the saliva on the ball is helping the bowlers a bit I guess. He got Sai [Sudharsan] and that changed the momentum for us, and then he came in and said let's start the wide yorkers earlier than trying it too late."