New Delhi: Champions are never wiped out easily. Rashid Khan The Gujarat Titans displayed a dose of age-old quality as they defeated Delhi Capitals by one run in a high-scoring thriller at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Wednesday night.Suspicion has surrounded Rashid for some time. He is going downhill. The batsmen have cracked his code. By his standards, after two tepid IPL seasons, the issues are understandable.Push boundaries with our YouTube channel. Subscribe now!His figures underscore the economic downturn. Last season, Rashid took 9 wickets at an average of 57.1 in 15 games for the Gujarat Titans. The year before was only slightly better. For a bowler known for his control, threat and certainty, it marked a clear decline.So it was no surprise when Rasheed interrupted the post-game interaction with an opening question, which was about last season. “Don’t remind me, it’s terrible,” he said, before explaining that his struggles over the past two years were related to the back surgery he had postponed in order to play in the 2023 ODI World Cup.“I think I put a lot of pressure on myself at that World Cup and after that, it was really bad. I couldn’t walk after the game,” he added. This makes his performance against Delhi Capitals all the more remarkable.On a surface that offered little help to the bowlers, Rashid was the only one to break the flow. He finished with 3/17 in four overs and stopped Capitals as the pace of the chase picked up. In the fifth over, he first hinted at his touch with the ball by beating KL Rahul with a leg-stroke that floated in and then spun away.Then he changed the game in the third round. Nitish Rana failed to pronounce “un” wrong and misjudged Sai Sudharsan in the long over. The next ball was even better – one that completely deceived Sameer Rizvi and gave him a golden duck. Rashid was later removed Axar Patel Meanwhile, the Capitals were off-balance in a chase they seemed to have control of.“After a long time, I got a wicket like this (of Rizvi’s). As a leg-spinner, you want that kind of bowling to the batsmen, where you beat the batsmen. I am happy and it gives me a lot of confidence. I feel that in the last two games, I have bowled well,” Rashid said.The leg-spinner attributes his return to improved fitness. “That surgery affected my bowling action, my delivery, everything. After having a bad season (in 2025), I was like, ‘OK, what’s wrong now?’ I felt like that was the whole rhythm, from start to finish.”“I gave myself a few months after the last IPL. I had a good hundred in England. I focused on my fitness. This is something I can improve on and get my body in shape to play at full pace,” he said.No testing yetAfghanistan are scheduled to play a one-off Test against India in the first week of June and the possibility of Rashid playing is highly unlikely. “The red ball looked a bit difficult for me. The first thing my doctor told me (after the surgery) was to stay away from it. I still hit 67 against Zimbabwe, which is crazy! I’ll take it easy. Just imagine what happened to my back in the Test,” he said.
