Mitchell Starc skipped the IPL for a decade, and the fast bowler's fade still hasn't come

Ten for 51 against Bangladesh in August, in a Test Australia won by an innings and 51 runs, is the sort of return a fast bowler usually produces in his mid-twenties rather than fifteen seasons into a career that began in December 2011. The theory attached to that longevity is the near-decade Mitchell Starc spent away from the IPL, a gap he credits himself, with 2027 still an open question. The salient fact behind the theory is how strongly the career is still going: in men's Tests over the last two years he has taken 90 wickets in 19 matches at an average of 19.89, against 28.97 for all bowlers in those Tests.

Why the back end of his career is the best of it

Across 108 Tests he averages 26.17 with the ball, so the recent run is a clear step up on his own career mark, which means the fade that usually arrives late for a fast bowler has yet to show. The run reads better as matches than as averages: a rout of West Indies in July 2025, the Ashes opener in November, and then the Bangladesh haul. Ten-wicket matches in two of his last eight Tests is a measure of how little the years have taken off him.

Does the rest explain it?

Any endorsement needs tempering, because the case for the IPL gap is built on what did not happen: the Aprils of travel and four-over bursts that a franchise season adds to a winter. What can be measured is where he stands now: our ratings have him twelfth among the world's Test bowlers, worth 13 runs a match more than an average player, on a record that is improving when it should be declining.

The corollary is that the IPL gap can be defended as the rational choice for a bowler whose returns are still climbing, without being credited for every wicket.

Should he play on to 2027?

The case for playing on is the last two years themselves, and it is strong: he took three wickets in the 214-run win at Kingsmead last week, and a bowler with hauls like August's has earned the right to make the 2027 call on his own terms.

Keeping April free was a defensible choice for a bowler whose whole living is the long run-up and the fourth spell of the day, whatever share of the wickets it deserves. The sensible decision for 2027 is to keep doing what has worked: more Tests, and the franchise money left on the table.