A down-the-wire game that ended in heartbreak for Multan last year triggered the owners to rejig the team and make decisions that are counted as anything but orthodox. Who would have foreseen Andy Flower getting replaced, no matter how good the incomer is? Or Hijab Zahid, in a first, entering as the team’s General Manager. Or is the trend continuing with Alex Hartley and Catherine Dalton joining the camp to coach spinners and fast bowlers respectively?
However, Multan has checked each box without caring much about the convention. As they steer closer and closer to the start of the PSL 2024, many unfortunate events keep hitting their windscreen to make the management, which already has a toll of proving plenty of points, bear more burden. Here’s PSL 2024 Multan Sultan Preview.
Sultans have been lurking around very close to the PSL trophy for two years running. A 42-run defeat in 2022 and a 1-run defeat in 2023 was how tantalizingly close they were to the glory but were denied each time by the same opponent. A lot surely has changed this year, and a lot was forced to be changed owing to injuries and the unavailability of players who without a flicker of doubt would have been impactful.
Sultans through the years:
Sultans have been on an ascension ever since the homecoming of PSL. Debuting in the third season of the league, the first two seasons of Multan in PSL remain, to date, the only seasons when the team did not make it to the finals. Moreover, no other team has a better W/L ratio than Multan so far in the PSL. Topping the charts with a Win-to-loss ratio as good as 1.37 showcases why Multan is a formidable opponent for other teams. This outstanding record makes them the favourites this year as well.
| Year | Matches | Won | Loss | Position | Summary |
| 2018 | 10 | 4 | 5 | 5/6 | League-stage |
| 2019 | 10 | 3 | 7 | 5/6 | League-stage |
| 2020 | 11 | 6 | 3 | 1/6 | Playoffs (3rd) |
| 2021 | 12 | 7 | 5 | 2/6 | Champions |
| 2022 | 12 | 10 | 2 | 1/6 | Runners-up |
| 2023 | 12 | 7 | 5 | 2/6 | Runners-up |
PSL 2024 Multan Sultan Preview and Last year’s team performance:
The final last year was a deja vu of the tournament opener in every way. It was Khushdil Shah vs Zaman Khan on the last ball in both instances. Qalandars pried victory from Multan’s fingers by a single run both times. Except for Shaheen Shah Afridi playing his father-in-law-esque innings, both matches were produced on the same script.
This year, Sultans will most dearly yearn the middle-order they had during the yesterseason, with the likes of David Miller, Tim David, Rilee Rossouw, and Khushdil Shah firing through to the end of the innings. To cash on the blitzkrieg this middle-order started, the bowlers of Multan made certain to turn the game into a nightmare for the batters.
In the previous edition of the league, Multan bowlers bowled out the opposition as many as four times throughout the tourney, a record none of the other teams could equal. A fleeting glimpse at the top wicket-takers of the last season is enough to show the excellence of the franchise’s bowling finesse.
| Player | Team | Wickets |
| Abbas Afridi | Multan Sultan | 23 |
| Ihsanullah | Multan Sultan | 22 |
| Rashid Khan | Lahore Qalandars | 20 |
| Shaheen Afridi | Lahore Qalandars | 19 |
| Usama Mir | Multan Sultan | 17 |
Despite this brilliance of the team as a whole, the Achilles’ Heel of Multan remained in their top order. Mohammad Rizwan’s power show helped the team strike at a fairly good rate during the powerplay overs.
However, Shan Masood’s placid run flow became a hurdle in the team’s early dominance over the opposition even on the featherbed of Rawalpindi. Before getting replaced by Usman Khan for the last three fixtures, Masood struck at an unexcitable rate of 124, which is the lowest among the team’s powerplay batters who have faced at least 15 balls.
This time around the Sultans appear packed with batters like Reeza Hendricks and Dawid Malan in their arsenal to complement Rizwan. The problem can appear with the team’s middle order as the departure of Rilee Rossouw, Tim David, and David Miller has left big shoes to fill for the newcomer
A one-two punch in Sultan’s fast bowling camp
Can there be a tougher start to a tournament campaign than losing two of your pacers before even playing a single game? We can ask Multan about this as they will be without the services of last season’s second-leading wicket-taker and one of the potential bests this season. Ihsanullah, whose availability was in augmenting shadows of doubt owing to his elbow injury has been joined by Reece Topley in the absentees of the season for Sultans. Topley was denied a No Objection Certificate (NOC) from England, citing workload management as the reason behind this decision.
While a replacement for the English pacer will be announced soon, the absence in itself is demoralizing for the franchise. His compatriot Olly Stone is one of the strongest contenders to fill in for Reece Topley.
What to look forward to:
With a person as brilliant as Nathan Leamon as their Strategist and Abdul Rehman heading the ginormously talented panel of coaches of the team, nothing less than intelligent cricket can be expected of Multan. The shortcoming that denied them the trophy in the past two years can now be overcome with the dynamic combination of players and management.
Top it off with Rizwan’s captaincy and the presence of a few youngsters including Faisal Akram, Aftab Ibrahim, Abbas Afridi, and Yasir Khan who are capable of wreaking havoc like none other and you can get just the right recipe to subdue the opponents in the six-team tournament.
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