The buoyant crowd at the Wankhede Stadium saw a blazing Sherfane Rutherford innings when the West Indies came out on top of England in a crunch Group C encounter at the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026. The innings was out of the ordinary. The innings was special. The innings announced that the southpaw is a crisis man for the Windies and can do the same for two months straight in the Mumbai Indians (MI) colours as well.
Sherfane Rutherford show at Wankhede
Coming to bat at number five, Rutherford’s team didn’t have a great start. After the powerplay, they were 55/3 as compared to England’s tally of 67/1. Rutherford played his entire innings post the six-over mark. England would’ve thought to neutralise his threat with three spin options in Adil Rashid, Liam Dawson and Will Jacks. While Roston Chase is touted to be a better player of spin, Rutherford needed to prove a point.
And that, he certainly did. Rashid, who was the best spinner on the day and found an over of 5 degrees of turn (the most by any spinner in the tournament so far), couldn’t dismiss Rutherford, who was happy to take 8 off 9 balls against the leggie. But the other two finger tweakers bore the brunt. Will Jacks was hit for two sixes and Harry Brook didn’t bowl him again after that. Dawson, meanwhile, was a bit quicker but that had no effect on the Guyanese, as he smoked 18 off 11 against him.
The most productive shot for Rutherford was the slogs he pummelled down the ground. The beauty of his hitting was that Rutherford was finding it quite easy to get under the ball. He was hitting them clean. He was hitting them long. While all the other West Indies batters had a combined strike rate of just over 151, Rutherford operated at 180.95. He was clearly the difference at the end. Jason Holder’s 33 off 17 was much-needed as well but Rutherford’s unbeaten 76 off 42 was special.
Catch T20 World Cup Live Here.
Rutherford excite Mumbai fans before IPL 2026
The Wankhede Stadium has a reputation of being a haven for batters. But in this tournament, it has been anything but. Ask Indians who were almost rolled over by a resurgent USA side. Had it not been for Suryakumar Yadav’s match-saving innings, India might have lost that game as well. Meanwhile, Gudakesh Motie and Adil Rashid showed that if you get the air and bowl slow, the pitch is offering enough turn.
Hence, it was not as easy to master an innings in Mumbai for Rutherford. But the English bowlers gave him enough reasons to dominate. This is something that the Mumbai Indians (MI) fans would love to see time and time again. After all, he will don the MI jersey come the IPL 2026. While MI had a silent IPL 2026 auction, they did a surreal job prior to that in trades. After securing Shardul Thakur, they got Rutherford for just INR 2.60 crore from GT, a figure which is a daylight robbery.
Sherfane Rutherford T20 stats (since SA20 2026)
| Category | Inns | Runs | HS | Avg | SR | 50 | 6s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Career T20 | 219 | 4295 | 86 | 24.97 | 139.40 | 18 | 270 |
| Since SA20 2026 | 14 | 499 | 76* | 71.28 | 173.86 | 4 | 38 |
You don’t often get incredible middle-order, left-hand bats who can smash quick runs to add a huge advantage to a T20 team. Ever since Kieron Pollard hung up his boots, MI failed to settle on one powerful middle-order dasher. Tim David was given opportunities but was let go early. Same with Tristan Stubbs. Kudos to MI for finding a gem in Naman Dhir but now with Rutherford’s addition, they really have added a cherry on top.
The 27-year-old, who has experience playing almost 220 T20 games, seems to have entered his prime. At SA20 for finalists Pretoria Capitals, Rutherford more often than not acted as a crisis man. On some difficult wickets, he resurrected PC’s innings and added flair and might. It may sound unreal but Rutherford is averaging almost 72 and and has a strike rate of north of 173 ever since SA20 2026.
