Your captain asks you to bowl the penultimate over of the match, but when you walk towards your bowling mark, he suddenly tells you that wait, you are, in fact, not bowling. You feel disappointed, your ego is bruised. Then you're lining up again, this time to bowl the final over. The opposition needs 11 to win.
You live up to your nickname, "Sniper", darting in pinpoint yorkers to help your team win by six runs. You thump your chest, telling everyone you rule the turf.
Tushar Deshpande experienced a whole gamut of emotions in taking Rajasthan Royals to a thrilling victory against Gujarat Titans in Ahmedabad last month.
"I had not planned that celebration," he says a few weeks later when we meet in Kolkata. "That celebration was kind of an aggression [in me] which started one over ago. I came on to bowl the 19th over. Riyan [Parag, Royals captain] told me, 'Tu daal' [You bowl], but when I went to my run-up, he said, 'Ruk, Jofra ko daalne de.' [Wait, let Jofra bowl it.] That kind of hurt me. I got a little dejected as to why not me, because I was confident of bowling the 19th over. Yorkers are my strength and the situation demanded yorkers. At the top of my mark, I told myself I can do the job, but at that very moment [Parag] took away the ball from me."
After the match Parag explained his decision to Deshpande: Archer's high pace could get them a wicket since there were two lower-order batters at the crease, Rashid Khan and Kagiso Rabada.
"The way Jofra bowled that over gave me the cushion of a few more runs [Archer didn't take a wicket but conceded only four runs] to defend because the margin of error was minuscule," Deshpande says.
After Archer had delivered the first two balls, Parag indicated to Deshpande to get ready to bowl the last over. Deshpande was "very pumped up". "This is my chance. Mujhe kar ke dikhana hai. [I have to show what I can do.] I had no other thought in my mind, [like] what if I fail, what if I don't defend?"
The red-soil pitch was very placid, Deshpande says. The slower ball was not gripping the surface and the dew was compounding issues for the bowlers. He told Parag he would stick to bowling yorkers.
His first delivery was a wide yorker to Rabada that turned into a full toss, which the umpire called wide. Deshpande did not alter his plan. The next ball - the first legitimate one - was also a full toss that Rabada scored a single off. With Rashid facing, Deshpande decided not to bowl the slower ball, though it was what teams would typically bowl to Rashid, because that delivery, he says, was high risk.
Having seen Rashid open the bat face late to deflect a wide yorker from Sandeep Sharma for four in the 18th over, Parag pushed third man back towards the boundary. A wise move, Deshpande acknowledges. He bowled a yorker on middle and off and Rashid duly opened the bat face but only got a single. Another yorker, another single to Rabada. Then a dot ball. Off the fifth, Rashid went for a wild heave over cover but was brilliantly caught at deep point. "He was expecting another yorker but I had told Riyan that I will bowl a bit wider. Rashid went for a big hit and the leading edge went to Jofra."
With Titans needing six off the final ball to force a Super Over, Deshpande delivered another dot and sealed the win for Royals, who had been staring at defeat when Titans had needed only 15 from the last two overs.
Playing his second season for Royals, Deshpande had an inauspicious start to the 2026 IPL, missing the first game because of a freak injury. He cringes as he explains. "I was speaking to my wife [on the phone]. I put some water in the kettle to boil. As I poured the water into the glass and picked it up, I [forgot] the water was boiling hot. It spilled on my hand and I dropped the glass, which fell straight on my right foot."
Blood oozed out of two of his toes, but Deshpande, desperate to play the game, particularly since it was against his old team, Chennai Super Kings, taped up his foot and tried to squeeze it into the shoe. He told Kumar Sangakkara, the Royals head coach, that he had played in worse situations. But Sangakkara asked him to think practically, not emotionally. "He gave me the clarity that this is not the last game of the season, it is the first," Deshpande says.
Royals bought him in the 2025 mega auction after he had had ankle surgery the year before. He took nine wickets in ten games - in a season in which Royals finished ninth on the points table - and says he was underprepared coming into the tournament.
"Going back home after last season, I learned I need to come up with something new this season or [present] a better version of myself, so that people [batters] wouldn't be able to [pick] me. Earlier seasons in IPL I was using wide yorkers, slower bouncers, but this season I needed to add something more, which I could use under pressure without bluffing."
What he worked on was to consistently bowl yorkers. He deployed his plans in domestic cricket for Mumbai not only in white-ball tournaments but also in the Ranji Trophy, where he was the side's leading fast bowler, taking 25 wickets in 15 innings at an average of 25.76. "If you see the way I bowled in domestic tournaments, it's been yorker, yorker, yorker and then a variation. IN the IPL, where 200 is easy to score, I want to bowl a high-percentage ball which will give me results and benefit my team. That ball is the yorker."
Deshpande says the role Royals have given him this season is challenging compared to what he did at CSK, where he would often bowl two overs in the powerplay followed by two at the death. Last season he was being juggled around a fair bit in the Royals bowling line-up, bowling with the new ball, at times bowling after the powerplay, or just bowling one over in all. "But now since I got role clarity before [the start of] this season - to shut [out] the powerplay, one in the middle and maybe two at the back end - that has helped me gain confidence. I am coming at the back end of the powerplay when the batters are set and are looking to go after the bowling. But my role is clear: finish the powerplay well, bowl high-percentage balls to certain fields."
At CSK, the team management - bowling coach Eric Simons, consultant Dwayne Bravo and former captain MS Dhoni - helped curb Deshpande's desire to keep trying different things and instead got him to focus on his plans. That grounding eventually led him to landing an India debut two years ago.
This IPL season has been one of learning for Deshpande, who has played five out of Royals' ten matches so far. In last month's encounter with Royal Challengers Bengaluru in Guwahati, he was swapped out for Brijesh Sharma, the uncapped fast bowler from Jammu and Kashmir, in what was explained to him as a tactical move.
"I got to know on the match day, after the toss [about the swap]," Deshpande says. "The Guwahati wicket was slow and low, where change of pace would be more effective, and the team management thought we'll go with Brijesh because he has good variations. He bowls very good change-of-pace and has good cutters. So I said, fair enough, whatever team requires I am there for the team. If you say tactical change, all right.
At the time, it got him down a bit, though. "I was told at the last minute," he says. "[Normally] we always plan in advance. For some time I thought: what did I lack that they chose Brijesh in place of me?
"[But] If I had cribbed, I would've f****d up with my mindset," Deshpande says, before quickly apologising for the expletive. "So I just thought, yes, it is a tactical change, let's stick to my mindset, the things I am doing that are helping me bowl better or bowl at my best. I was very happy the way Brijesh bowled and we won [against RCB]."
Not getting a continuous run, Deshpande admits, has played on his mind, especially since he considers himself one of Royals' top bowlers, one who has proved he can perform in high-pressure situations, as he did at CSK. He has had open conversations with Sangakkara and Shane Bond, the bowling coach, to seek not only their backing but also impress upon them why he believes he should be among the first picks.
He turns 31 next week. He recently became a father and has been using his days off during this IPL to head home to Mumbai to spend time with his four-month-old son, but he remains firm on his career ambition to earn more India caps. His two T20Is came in Zimbabwe in 2024, but the ankle surgery pushed him to the back of the queue of fast bowlers vying for a place in the side. Earlier this year, having played the full 2025-26 domestic season and turned in some notable performances, Deshpande was asked to join a group of six fast bowlers for a three-day session, mostly focused on first-class bowling, at the Centre of Excellence in Bengaluru with Zaheer Khan, the former India fast bowler.
Deshpande is no doubt restless to play again for India, but he knows the only thing that will get him there are consistent performances. "Since I have come back from ankle surgery, from the last IPL and the full domestic season this time in each format, performance is something I'm focusing on. It is about me getting better every day.
"Because I can't all the time chase [the dream] that I want to play for India. Yes, I want to play for India again, that goal is still there and will always be there, obviously. Since I made my first-class debut, my goal of picking up 100 wickets for India has always been there. I always have the self-belief that I will make it again. That is my expectation from myself and I think this is what I deserve. I have worked for it. I am ready now."