The series was on the line – or at least that’s how it felt – and after 90 overs of the best Test cricket in a long time both Australia and India are still in with a shout

Jarrod Kimber in Bengaluru05-Mar-2017″India is done”.That is what my auto-rickshaw driver shouted out at some Indian flag-holding fans on their way to the ground. He had seen enough; they were finished, gone, broken. According to him, there was little reason even to play the second day in Bengaluru.But even coming in, it was the most important day of the Test, and the series. If Australia put on a big total, it would be hard to see how India could win this match or even draw the series. Hell, they be done. And even as good as Australia have been – they have dominated only three and a half days of cricket on this tour – a couple of bad sessions and all those Indian memories come back. The third innings of the second Test in India has devoured them before.So India couldn’t be done until the battle for day two had been won.*****Steven Smith is leaving the ball like it is an act of war, never has a leave had so much naked aggression. Kohli is yammering away, India’s fielders lean into Smith, clapping fiercely, and Ishant Sharma stares long and hard after almost every delivery.There is no doubt this is tough cricket, India are determined to stay in this series, Australia are desperate not to allow them. Smith’s first run had almost brought a tussle, when he had pushed one down the pitch and Renshaw didn’t move, meaning R Ashwin crashed into him, and then the umpire had to intervene.It was tough, dirty, sweaty cricket. Every over seemed to have a half-chance, a low bouncing ball, or an act of aggression from someone. Smith would defend and pull a face, Ishant would mock that face. An lbw shout would almost end up in a run-out. Ishant would fall over after bowling, but even mid-tumble, continue his death stare at Renshaw. Smith is almost out lbw again, and the same ball Renshaw is almost run-out again. Ashwin is ripping the ball a body width and a half. Then the ball would run along the ground and Kohli would make sure the Australians remembered it.Ishant Sharma and Steven Smith engaged in a war of facial expressions•Associated PressAt one stage almost every player on the ground and the umpires are in the middle of the pitch, talking, arguing locked in an endless battle of mental disintegration. There were 21 runs and a wicket in the first hour; 14 overs of cricket dripping in sweat after being punched in the gut.Even as they have their drinks, the Indian team form a shape that allows them to continue to sledge the Australians, and the Australians sledge back. Smith and Kohli are engaged in an epic rap battle to the death.All this while Ishant and Umesh Yadav are bowling the spells of their lives. They are using the natural deviation of the pitch, cracks and general lowness, plus the man-made reverse swing, to torture Smith into an innings of by-any-means-necessary survival. They just didn’t bowl bad balls, they attacked the stumps, attacked his leaves, and attacked his ears. And they did it all morning.Smith did survive, and while thriving was never really an option, with Jadeja coming on, he would have at least felt relief at seeing Ashwin off. But then, the Australian captain got an inside edge, and 20.1 overs only ended up only counting for 30 runs, so India is not yet done.*****In the final scene of the film , Chance the gardener walks on water. The meaning of that, though widely debated, is in the honesty of his ignorance he is able to do something impossible. Essentially, Chance walks on water because he has never thought about it enough to know he can’t.Steve O’Keefe said of Matt Renshaw in the last Test that he didn’t have the scar tissue of playing in Asia. For Renshaw, this is all marvellous; he looks as relaxed in the back of car smiling for the locals as he does out in the middle facing Umesh’s testing reverse swing. In eight overs Umesh bowls five maidens, and goes for 14 runs, 12 of which are from the edge of Renshaw’s bat. At one point, Umesh storms down the wicket to tell the batsman about it and Renshaw shrugs like a lovable doofus from a sit com.Matt Renshaw loved being out in the middle•Associated PressRenshaw’s main scoring shot is through slips, and it is, for most of the morning, his only scoring shot. Whether it zips through Kohli’s hand, or through the gap, Renshaw beams like he is just happy to be there. He bats as if uninterested in the outside world, while others fight and scrap.Shaun Marsh seems to either get grubbers that just hit him outside the line, or be rapped on the gloves by one of the few balls that truly rise. But there is one over when Marsh decides not just to defend. When Ashwin bowls one on a similar line and length to those he had been bowling all day – a foot outside leg stump, ripping across the left-hander – Marsh chooses not to stand up and play it, but get inside and sweep. A few balls later he is inside the ball again, he misses it, but it trickles down the leg side for byes. Then he handles a ball from Ashwin with no trouble at all, and takes nine off the over. The next over, he smashes a pull of Umesh. Australia score 13 runs off the last two overs. Before that they had scored 13 runs in the 13 overs.You could almost feel day two breathe, for the first time.It is right there, with the runs trickling for the first time all day, with Marsh set and surviving and Renshaw batting in a coma of childhood ignorance that Australia look like they are finally going to pull away. Renshaw is walking down the wicket and hitting Ashwin to wide long-on, Marsh is finding runs easily, and when Jadeja comes back on they seem to want to make sure Kohli doesn’t feel like using him again.CricViz says that Renshaw came down the pitch four times in his first 185 balls and then ten times in his last 11 balls, a period coinciding with the introduction of Jadeja. The third-last ball he comes down, he bonks a six over long off. The second-last time, he chips to midwicket for no run. The last time, he telegraphs his intention to Jadeja about four seconds before the ball is bowled. And again, India is still not done.*****Shaun Marsh might be forging a career for himself as a specialist batsman in Asia. He is not very good against seam but is brilliant against spin. He is not particularly good at home, he is worse than that in most places, but in Asia, he averages almost 60. There are many who don’t think he is good at all, but he is tasty in Asia.In the 57th over, Marsh survives a ball that keeps very low, tails in, thumps into his pad, but is just outside the line of off stump. The next ball, landing in a similar spot, hits a crack, jumps up, leaves him, and probably takes his thumb on the way through to Saha, who ends up being the only guy who believes it did.Shaun Marsh showed his class against spin•AFPMarsh squiggles across the crease to the seamers, he handles the spinning ball, and his whole innings seems like a cacophony of chances, but on the only real one he gave India don’t review. And so for 197 balls, Marsh hears the howl of a half chance, always finds himself just outside the line or just missing the edge to collect a battle-scarred fifty.Matthew Wade joins him, and while far from convincing, the two of them put on the fastest partnership of the day. They even bring up the lead, which, had felt a long way off for most of the dayThen Umesh fires another one at Marsh’s pads, and this time, it looks pretty close, and is given. Marsh reviews, and he was outside the line. Next over, Ishant hits Marsh even plumber, there is no mistaking this one, Marsh is right in front, and it would had been out had Ishant not overstepped.Twice India think they have him, twice he escapes.Now all Marsh has to do is make it to stumps, if he does that, the chances of India being able to match the incredible intensity, and bowling performance of today, seems pretty unlikely. If Marsh makes it to stumps, maybe India is done.If anyone is going to survive this day, it should be the specialist who has fought against the pitch with vicious worm balls, angry cracks, heaving reverse swing, and devious turn. It looks like he will fight his way through one of the greatest, and toughest, days of Test cricket you are ever going to see. That he will change his narrative and score the seminal Marsh hundred that parents tell their kids about.Then he limps one to short midwicket. All that trench-warfare batting, the great escapes, the scratches and bruises, are tossed away to the fielder like a child throwing away a doll they don’t want to play with anymore.Australia make 197 runs, India take six wickets, both teams trade blood, sweat and insults, and according to the bookies, win predictors and cricket pundits, the chances of victory are roughly the same as they had been at the start of the day.Australia fought well but didn’t win the battle of day two, and India struggled but are not yet done.

We often hear fans cry out for them as batsmen rack up the runs in T20, but there are reasons for why they aren’t as effective as they once were

Jarrod Kimber16-Apr-2017″Where has the real good yorker gone in the game? Where’s it gone? It’s not bowled enough,” says Kevin Pietersen. Ravi Shastri replies, “It’s not practised enough.” Pietersen agrees and adds, “Lasith Malinga before every game he bowled, all he would do is bowl at a cone, and you know he was trying to do one thing, and he was a master.”Ah, the yorker of yore, yes, why can’t we go back to that time, and make yorkers great again?This is a pretty typical conversation you hear on cricket commentary. This one came during the opening game of this season’s IPL. Just after the conversation fizzled out, something bizarre happened: Deepak Hooda went across until he was outside off stump, and then he went behind his stumps to play a shot.Pietersen made a huge deal about Hooda going behind the bowling crease. But the shot was a perfect explanation of why the talk about yorkers these days is so poor. Bowlers do bowl yorkers, and they do practise bowling yorkers. But no cone jumps outside off stump and then behind the stumps. Cones stand still.

Bowlers do bowl yorkers, and they do practise bowling yorkers. But no cone jumps outside off stump and then behind the stumps. Cones stand still

In 2016, more successful yorkers were bowled than in any other IPL season before it.

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ESPNcricinfo analysts have decided that a successful yorker is a ball that lands on a length where it yorks the bat. It couldn’t be more simple. If it bounces too short, it’s a half-volley; if the batsman hits it on the full, they mark it as a full toss. It doesn’t matter if the ball was a wicket or a four – to us they are yorkers.What we don’t have data on is unsuccessful yorkers – balls that were bowled the perfect length, but where the batsman changed the length through his footwork or shot, because there is no camera permanently above the wicket feeding us that data. We know that hardly ever is a full toss intentionally bowled, and that many are failed yorkers.Even without the empirical evidence that proves more successful yorkers are now bowled, it makes sense. In ODIs we have almost doubled the number of sixes in the last ten years, from 4.75 per match in 2006 to 8.73 in 2016. T20 seems as if it’s about to free itself of cricket norms and reach for the stars. Run rates in both formats are up, and bowlers are gasping for air. Would they really not try the ball even a casual fan would tell them is the hardest to score off?

The historical data on the number of yorkers bowled per match in the IPL says a little about what has happened to batting in T20. An average of over four successful yorkers were bowled each game in the first three seasons. Then, as the real improvisations in batting took full effect, that dropped to under four, and in 2013 it was at 3.05. Since then bowlers have fought back and 2016 was the first season on record that was over five.The types of bowlers who have produced the most successful yorkers have also changed. In the first season of the IPL it was Munaf Patel and Glenn McGrath: tall, not very fast, accurate bowlers. Bowlers of that type have never led the league in yorkers since. The only time tall bowlers make that list is when they are out-and-out speed guys like Shaun Tait and Morne Morkel – every other bowler is regular-human size, not giant-fast-bowler size.So what happened after that one season?The data is conclusive: short, accurate bowlers like the Kumars Vinay, Praveen and Bhuvneshwar all feature in this list, as does fellow shorty Ashok Dinda. Umesh Yadav, Brett Lee and Dirk Nannes are there with their extra pace. None are that tall. And the bowlers with unpickable slower balls or weird actions, like Dwayne Bravo, Malinga, Jasprit Bumrah and Mustafizur Rahman are well accounted for.Short, accurate bowlers like Bhuvneshwar Kumar are more likely than tall ones to bowl good yorkers these days•AFPThe images that we have when we think of yorkers are of Joel Garner, Waqar Younis, Curtly Ambrose, Darren Gough and McGrath rattling stumps. Guys like Waqar and Gough still exist – shorter guys with more round-arm actions – but the taller guys have all but disappeared. As almost nothing in cricket happens by accident, the reason bowlers of this type don’t bowl as many yorkers anymore is that their yorkers aren’t working.A tall, accurate bowler has a larger chance of getting a yorker wrong than a shorter, skiddier bowler – that’s just science. Taller bowlers often have classical actions, as they are trying to make the most of their height, meaning nothing of their actions is a surprise for batsmen. And while some taller bowlers have great slower balls – Clint McKay is a perfect recent example – most of them haven’t had to master skullduggery, because in the lower levels of cricket their height and pace was more than enough.The perfect bowler of a yorker in T20 would be a 90mph unorthodox bowler with a low-arm action who has a hard-to-pick slower ball. Aka Malinga.

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When I was a teenager, the yorker tormented me. At the start I’d never got out to many, but then suddenly it was every second dismissal for months on end. This wasn’t just to the odd express bowler; I missed some kind-old-man medium pace as well. Not being very talented, all I could rely on was thinking my way out.And when I thought about yorkers, I realised how silly they were. I loved to drive; I could drive all day, full tosses and half-volleys, and yet when the ball was in between, instead of taking a big step down the wicket and playing a cover drive, I suddenly froze and was trying to dig them out.

Run rates are up and bowlers are gasping for air. Would they really not try the ball even a casual fan would tell them is the hardest to score off?

Did a yorker even exist, or was it a psychological construct that slowed my feet? Was I being tormented by myself and not the bowlers?The truth is somewhere in the middle. At pace, I don’t have the skill to just take a step forward and knock back a low full toss. Really accurate bowlers also found that exact yorker length that makes you doubt you can change the length. And then there is the surprise factor. In most proper cricket innings, the yorker is one of the balls you are least likely to face, so having an entire plan for it seemed kind of weird. Eventually I just reduced my backlift and went back to only being dismissed by a reasonable number of yorkers.There is obviously a science as to why the yorker is a good ball. If you try and play an attacking shot, your bat won’t be flush with the ground, opening up a chance for the ball to go under it. Unlike other balls, it makes you feel like you need to dig, not bat, which changes the way you bat, and often the face of the bat is not as straight. Plus, hitting the ground with the bat means you are not in control of it. And for generations the toe of the bat had the effectiveness of a piece of wilted lettuce.But batting is no longer a skinny kid with a cheap bat and endless cricket dread when facing a yorker; it has grown up too.

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In the ’90s, kiddies, things were different. If you wanted someone to go in and bash the ball, you often sent in a pinch-hitter, who was usually a big, strong bowler, like Pat Symcox or Craig McDermott. Batsmen hit the odd six, but if you needed a bunch, you sent in a strongman bowler or a strapping allrounder.Batsmen weren’t all little guys or slim-hipped fleet-of-foot types, but they were regular human size. Sure, cricket had flirted with bigger batsmen, but batsmen weren’t built for power. Lance Klusener only made international cricket because he was an allrounder. He wasn’t built like a batsman, and when he started in first-class cricket, he batted 11. In Tests, he batted as low as ten. But when he became a batsman, it was spectacular.Lance Klusener was among the few batsmen of his time who was seemingly impervious to yorkers•PA PhotosAt the 1999 World Cup he made 281 runs, averaging 140 at a strike rate of 122. The top order had been weaponised since 1996, but the middle order was still a place for human calculators like Michael Bevan, Russel Arnold and Chris Harris, with an allrounder thrown in to hopefully slog a few. Klusener combined both roles, and hit boundaries like an axeman while producing like a calculator; a middle-overs killing machine.There was no real way to contain him in that period, and that is largely because of what he did to yorkers. Other batsmen, like Carl Hooper, Martin Crowe and Dean Jones, had tried ways to make yorkers easier to play, with shorter backlifts or by batting deep in the crease or way out of it. But Klusener didn’t just chip yorkers around and score the odd boundary; he crushed the life out of them. Other batsmen struggled to get power from low full tosses; if you slightly overpitched to Klusener, he hit the ball with Thor’s hammer through cover or midwicket. If you underpitched even slightly, he’d destroy the ball over long-on. And even when you hit the perfect length, he dropped his massive bat made of anvils on the ball and it sped off square of the wicket.Klusener’s bat seemed ideal to handle yorkers, and he was range-hitting almost a generation before it became commonplace.Now there are many batsmen of Klusener’s size and strength. Batsmen, not bowlers, are now the big-muscle guys. The bats are also better, the middle longer, there is much more wood at the bottom, and they are lighter than when Klusener was playing. Range-hitting and getting your front foot out of the way are now just everyday cricket.

The perfect bowler of a yorker in T20 would be a 90mph unorthodox bowler with a low-arm action who has a hard-to-pick slower ball. Aka Malinga

The shots have changed too. Cricket has a long history of batsmen coming up with a shot that completely changes what bowlers have to do. In modern cricket, short fine-leg came up into the circle as batsmen started peppering the leg-side boundary in front of square, and so Douglas Marillier played a lap to that position. Ryan Campbell took it a step further. And then there was Tillakaratne Dilshan’s scoop, which was essentially an overhead sweep shot. None of those shots was specifically aimed at stopping yorkers, but all of them played a part in yorkers coming under attack.The one that seems to have directly come from yorkers was the helicopter shot that Santosh Lal gave his friend MS Dhoni. Instead of a normal drive with weight on the front foot, this was played off the back foot, and because of it, a yorker often became a half-volley. It’s about looser wrists, and flicking a ball in the air that you would normally have to hit down on, turning yorkers and near-yorkers into sixes.Recently Nasser Hussain did an incredible masterclass on the yorker. He starts off with a bunch of cones placed around the crease from just outside leg stump all the way to wide on the off side. The space enclosed, he explains, is where you could bowl a successful yorker five or ten years ago. Gradually, for a variety of reasons (reverse swing going, umpires getting stricter on leg-side wides) he starts removing cones until he’s standing within a tiny space.This space is bigger than the handkerchief that bowlers claimed to hit when practising bowling yorkers in the old days, but not that much bigger. It is there in this tiny little yorker place that he asks, even after allowing for everything he has just said: “Why aren’t they finding the hole more often?”Dilshan’s trademark scoop was one of the shots that made bowling yorkers a trickier business•AFPThese cones, like the ones Malinga aims at before his bowling, don’t move. The yorker hole is as small as it has ever been, and it moves more than ever before, depending on the batsman’s whims. The damn thing can run behind the stumps, be outside leg, or not be on the pitch on the off at all. Not to mention bigger batsmen and bats, better training, smaller grounds, and a format that practically begs for more sixes to be hit. And people ask why they’re not finding the hole?

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We have all heard a commentator, or our drunk uncle, say, “Just bowl 24 yorkers, it’s simple.” It isn’t simple. Garner couldn’t bowl 24 successful yorkers in a row. And that is with a batsman standing in roughly the same place on the crease each ball. If you went at 0.8 runs per yorker (the rough average across IPL history) for 18 balls, and the other balls in your spell went for two sixes, two fours and a couple of twos, you’re still looking at almost ten an over.Some modern batsmen actually like it when a bowler tries six yorkers in an over. It means they can formulate a plan, and they know that even if they don’t move in the crease much, one will be over- or under-pitched, and that one is gone. Five singles and a six is still 11 an over.Not all modern batsmen have power, not all improvise. There are some batsmen – let’s call them Pakistani – who are still playing T20 cricket in a pre-Klusener way, where against pace everything must go over midwicket. Other batsmen don’t have a lot of power, so usually they play their power shots to leg, so bowling wide yorkers to them can restrict them when the ball gets softer or they get tired.Most batsmen now do play all the shots. England bowled well to Carlos Brathwaite at the start of his innings in the World T20 final. Chris Jordan went with a wide yorker so that Brathwaite couldn’t use his power. Then David Willey tried straighter yorkers to cramp Brathwaite. He was new to the crease, he couldn’t find his timing, and the full bowling was doing the job. Then Brathwaite realised that this was their plan, so when Willey tried another one, he played a lap scoop, the first one he had ever played in a match, and it went for four. That was his only boundary before the final over.

We have all heard a commentator, or our drunk uncle, say, “Just bowl 24 yorkers, it’s simple.” It isn’t simple

Against Ben Stokes he stood deep in his crease, and after trying one into the pitch first ball, Stokes didn’t nail one good yorker in the next three he attempted. Had he tried a ball that wasn’t a yorker, he might have at least made Brathwaite think. Instead Brathwaite, like he did against Willey, knew where they were going to be, and used it to win the game.You could use Stokes’ over to prove how important yorkers can be, but it also shows what happens when you miss them now. The reward for yorkers has never been greater, but neither has the risk.When you look at data for the best Test bowlers, even on surfaces that help them, with no one moving around the crease or trying to slaughter each ball, they have groupings where the balls can pitch up to a metre apart, and usually more. And that is a bowler who is trying to run in and hit the same spot ball after ball for an entire day, whose body is grooved into that length by muscle memory. And yet they can’t do it. If they miss by 25 centimetres, looking for a good back-of-a-length ball, or a well-flighted offbreak, not much happens.Try missing a yorker by that much. The ball is gone.

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It started with coaches putting shoes on the crease and then asking their quicks to hit them. Then some bowling coaches tried having a piece of string set up a few inches above the ground and the bowlers have to bowl under them. Now there is a different system for England bowlers like Jordan.He puts one cone out for the wide yorker, one for the straight yorker, and one for the yorker down leg, for when the batsman backs away and gives himself room. Then as he comes in to bowl, his coach, Ottis Gibson, shouts out which colour cone he needs to aim for as he hits the crease. It is still not as exact as bowling to a batsman doing the same thing, but it’s clear that bowlers are trying to work this out. Bowlers have never practised yorkers more, or smarter, than they do now.Almost 10% of Malinga’s deliveries in the IPL have been yorkers – but they are still outnumbered by full tosses•BCCIThere is a clip online of Chris Woakes, Jimmy Anderson and Jordan bowling that shows them attempting to pitch it underneath a specially designed gate. The clip shows how good Jordan is at this; the other two regularly hit the gate (and Woakes and Anderson are renowned as very accurate bowlers) whereas Jordan regularly goes under the gate and hits the stump. The ECB put this video online, apparently to show how often their bowlers were hitting the yorker length; but even so, their bowlers did not hit it every ball. And one commenter, CallMeSir, said, “They play international cricket!! They should be hitting yorkers every time.”In basketball, if you are fouled when shooting, you receive a free throw. A shot with the game clock stopped, with no defenders in your face, where the player can take his time, from 15 feet, a shot that has been practised their entire life. NBA players in total still only hit that shot 77% of the time. They play in the best basketball league on earth! They should be hitting their free throws every time.

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Malinga was the first great T20 bowler. In seven IPL seasons he has 143 wickets at 17, with an economy rate of 6.67. Even as his pace has gone down over the years, even as his knee has troubled him and his midriff has occasionally ballooned out, he has been incredible year after year. And in all seven seasons he has played, he has led the league the in number of successful yorkers bowled.

Of Malinga’s 143 IPL wickets, 18% are from yorkers. The next best is 8% for Tait. Tait also has the second-highest percentage of yorkers bowled (among bowlers who have bowled in over 20 games) with 6.13% – Malinga is at 9.48%. And you want to know how hard it is to bowl yorkers? The man that everyone in cricket says is the best yorker bowler in cricket bowls more full tosses than yorkers. And we don’t even have data on how many half-volleys he bowls.Malinga leads the league in percentage of full tosses bowled, 11.49%. From those, he has around 12% of his wickets. So from around 20.9% of his deliveries he takes 30.07% of his wickets. The next closest are Bumrah and Chris Morris, who bowl 15% and 12% of their balls as full tosses or yorkers, and those get them 11% and 12% of their wickets.

But it gets better when you look at the full-toss stats on their own. When Malinga bowls a full toss in the IPL, his bowling average is 18.5, and his economy is 7.18. He is better when bowling full tosses than most bowlers are when hitting the pitch. All the other top yorker bowlers go at over nine an over when bowling full tosses, because they are normal human beings. With the worst delivery in cricket, Malinga is still a gun. That is because even his full tosses and half-volleys are hard to play, because his deliveries do something that very few bowlers have ever managed to make theirs do: they dip.A normal high-arm action doesn’t let the ball dip much and even a roundish-arm action like Mitchell Johnson’s or Fidel Edwards’ doesn’t. Malinga’s action is so much lower than that of a normal bowler that he’s almost more of a freak than Murali. You can see at times the ball is not rotating end over end, like with an average seamer, but instead hovering like a UFO, and is just as unpredictable. And when he bowls a slower ball, they drop off a cliff. The number of times Malinga gets a wicket from a full toss that the batsman plays over the top of is incredible. So even when you pick the slower ball, and the length, the ball isn’t quite where you need it to be.

The reward for yorkers has never been greater, but neither has the risk

You can move around the crease to him, but when you do that, he either slides one through that skids low off the surface, making you mis-hit it, or he bowls one of these savage dipping cutters that goes underneath or over your blade. Not to mention that he’s still more than quick enough for a shock short ball. Angled-bat shots are more risky with him than with any seamer before him, and all you are left with is straight-bat shots, over his head or over your head.Why don’t more people bowl yorkers like Malinga does? The answer is simple: no one bowls yorkers like Malinga does. Asking another bowler to deliver yorkers like that is like asking another person to bowl at Shoaib Akhtar’s pace or with Shane Warne’s spin and consistency – it’s not going to happen. A tall bowler who bowls at the same pace as Malinga, with a standard action and a decent slower ball, would get murdered if he tried as many yorkers as Malinga.Forget your romantic image of the yorker of yore, the Malinga golden unicorn of destruction, and making the yorker great again. The yorker of reality is being tried. Sometimes it is bowled well, sometimes it isn’t bowled well; sometimes it works, and sometimes it ends up in row 17.That is the fate of the modern-day yorker.

Plays of the day from the second one-day international between England and Ireland at Lord’s

Andrew Miller07-May-2017Shot of the dayThe challenge of containing England’s run-hungry batsmen wasn’t lost on Ireland’s senior seamer, Tim Murtagh, who took the first over from the Nursery End and settled into his habitual Lord’s line and length, a beat he’s been keeping for nigh on a decade at Middlesex. But then, with his fourth ball, he overpitched just a touch, and Jason Roy was ready to make him pay. Out came that most sumptuous of straight drives, and a far-from-terrible delivery had been scorched straight back past the stumps for four.Ball of the dayMurtagh, however, couldn’t be put off from doing what he does best, and in a superb opening spell of 6-0-16-1, he probed a fullish length with a bit of nibble off the seam, and demanded respect from England’s openers. And his one breakthrough in that spell was a beauty. Alex Hales, seeing the ball well once again, had just clumped his sixth boundary through the covers, when Murtagh responded by nipping a cutter back up the slope. Hales, shaping for a repeat drive, was in no-man’s land as the ball scudded through his bat and pad to take out middle and leg.Let-off of the dayEoin Morgan had been in a hurry to make his mark on his former team-mates, but the introduction of the lobby offspin of Paul Stirling so nearly brought him to a standstill. On 39, he gave himself room outside leg stump, but got himself in a tangle as Stirling speared the ball into his pads. The ball squeezed a path through his legs, rolled down into the crease and nestled tantalisingly at the base of the stumps. The bails, however, refused to budge, and England’s captain breathed again.Parry of the dayRelay catches are becoming second nature to professional cricket teams all around the world, so there was nothing especially out of the ordinary about George Dockrell’s brave effort on the midwicket boundary, as he stretched high to intercept a hoick across the line from Jonny Bairstow, and fling it back into play once he realised his momentum was toppling back into the Mound Stand. However, the look on his face afterwards told a story. Where was his support? With no-one rushing round to offer him assistance, Dockrell had no option but to settle for a saved six.Cameo of the dayMurtagh had shown the way where local knowledge of Lord’s was concerned; now it was the turn of Ireland’s other Middlesex regular, Paul Stirling. Last week, he warmed up for this contest with 71 from 60 balls in Middlesex’s Royal London clash with Sussex, and today he started with even more explicit intent, smashing five fours from his first eight balls to hurtle to 22 from eight. The pick of his innings was yet to come, however, a lean-back-and-wallop for six as Mark Wood dropped only a fraction too short. As with too many of Stirling’s innings, it wasn’t built to last, but it was certainly fun while it did.

Bangladesh have not beaten India in a global tournament since that famous win in 2007. We take a look at how they could halt India’s run

ESPNcricinfo staff14-Jun-2017Apart from Tamim Iqbal, Bangladesh’s top order has been jittery so far this Champions Trophy•ESPNcricinfo LtdAddress top-order wobbles and over-dependence on TamimTamim Iqbal, with 223 runs from the first two matches, carried Bangladesh’s batting on his own. The rest of the top order, though, has had a lean time, and selection changes have failed to turn fortunes around so far. In seven innings in total, Soumya Sarkar, Imrul Kayes and Sabbir Rahman have scored just 67 runs at an average of 11.17. They will be up against India’s pace attack, whose economy rate of 4.33 in the Powerplay has been the best in the tournament so far.Rubel Hossain has had the measure of Virat Kohli in recent times•ESPNcricinfo LtdUnleash the Fizz, target Kohli’s Achilles heelIndia’s top order, on the other hand, has struck fine form in the three games so far, accumulating 609 from Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli. Bangladesh, though, have bowlers who have managed to trouble them in the past with variations and pace. For a start, India are Mustafizur Rahman’s favourite opponents – he has 13 wickets at 11.53 from three games against them. Rubel Hossain has had the measure of Kohli, dismissing him twice in the last four matches between these sides, including the World Cup quarter-final in 2015. India’s lower order has not been under pressure yet, and winning these mini-tussles could hold the key for Bangladesh.India’s late-innings accelerators will be up against a Bangladesh attack that has been miserly in recent years•Getty ImagesWin the death overs battleDespite having an ordinary tournament so far, Bangladesh’s bowlers possess the second-best record among the top eight sides in the death overs since World Cup 2015, conceding just 6.8 runs per over at an impressive average of 16.00. They will be up against one of the most destructive sides in the last ten overs, scoring at 8.18 per over in the same period. Should India bat first, Bangladesh’s ability to restrict them in this phase could make the difference between a competitive total and one beyond their reach.

After being rolled over in Wellington, the final match of the season will go a long way in defining how it is remembered

Andrew McGlashan19-Mar-2017New Zealand will spend two days debriefing and soul-searching as they try to prevent their season ending with a whimper following the three-day thrashing at the Basin Reserve.Five days and a session of toe-to-toe cricket – throughout the Dunedin game and until lunch on the second day in Wellington – unravelled with alarming haste against South Africa. No wonder Kane Williamson looked bemused and not a little careworn, as he tried to explain it away in the bowels of the Basin on Saturday evening.New Zealand – both the players and management – have been reluctant to say that the visit of South Africa would define their season. But if they do not put in a better performance at Seddon Park starting on Saturday the last few weeks will certainly influence how their 2016-17 campaign is judged.They were favourites against Pakistan and Bangladesh, duly completing victories in all series against them, although had to overcome a first-innings total of 595 for 8 to beat Bangladesh in the Wellington Test. They regained the Chappell-Hadlee trophy 2-0 when Australia were missing some key players but the series across the Tasman was a one-sided affair.So far against South Africa, the T20 – albeit a one-off – was a walkover for the visitors, the one-day series was an oscillating affair, but two awful batting displays in Wellington and Auckland cost New Zealand, and now they are 1-0 down in the Tests after collapsing for 171.It should be noted that this was only New Zealand’s fourth Test defeat at home in 22 matches – dating back to South Africa’s previous visit here in 2012 when they won a match in similar fashion in Hamilton courtesy of a New Zealand batting implosion – although two of those losses came last year in the previous marquee series, against Australia.There is no disgrace in losing, but the manner of this defeat will be a concern and no doubt added to angst felt by Williamson and the other New Zealand representatives put up to explain what happened. In place of Mike Hesson, who had not recovered from a stomach bug which forced him to watch the third day from his hotel, it was batting coach Craig McMillan who attempted a mixture of stern but measured assessment.”Yesterday was a terrible day and to lose within three days was unacceptable. The group is hurting and disappointed but it’s something we have to acknowledge,” he said. “It’s important to remember, while yesterday wasn’t good, it’s only just over a week ago that we performed pretty well in that first Test. We need to get back to that standard and bounce back quickly for Hamilton.”In an echo of what Williamson and Hesson said after the batting collapses in the one-day series, the inability to soak up pressure during key phases of the game was at the forefront. Having recovered to be 217 for 5 on the opening day in Wellington, they collapsed to the part-time offspin of JP Duminy; in the middle of the second day – after having South Africa 94 for 6 – Quinton de Kock and Temba Bavuma added 160 before the last-wicket pair then added 57 to treble the lead and, with the deficit almost wiped out, they handed Keshav Maharaj two wickets in an over.”When those pressure points come up you have to have individuals stand up and grab them,” McMillan said. “Even that last-wicket partnership between Philander and Morkel which pushed the lead from 30 to 80 was quite a telling point – those two guys stood up and that’s what we need our guys to do. “There is unlikely to be much ripping up of the script from New Zealand. Ross Taylor (calf) and Trent Boult (groin) will join up with the squad in Hamilton to have their injuries assessed – the latter appears more likely to be fit – and legspinner Ish Sodhi could be added, when the squad is named on Tuesday, in place of seamer Matt Henry.Tom Latham’s form is an increasing problem – his poor run in one-day cricket now affecting his Test returns which, overall, are very solid – but in reality, there is not a vast amount more the selectors can do. A myriad of names have been bandied around over the last 24 hours – from Dean Brownlie (who is injured) and George Worker, to Colin Munro and Tom Bruce – but there is not a specialist opener demanding inclusion. Only the return of Taylor would really strengthen the middle order.”The selection panel, one of their key traits has been loyalty and I think that’s served us well,” McMillan said. “I’m sure there’ll be plenty of discussions between Mike Hesson and [selector] Gavin Larsen over the next day or so. There are a lot of domestic players going really well around the country but I firmly believe within our group we have the best players to do well.”When you have a performance like that, those sorts of discussions have to be had. We’ve got the best players in New Zealand in the squad and in Dunedin they showed they’re good enough to compete with South Africa.”They did compete in Dunedin, but a lot can change in a few days. Or as Wellington showed, even a few hours.

On a day of more spills than thrills for Sri Lanka, Nuwan Pradeep stuck out with his improved repertoire and penetration, even overshadowing Rangana Herath

Andrew Fidel Fernando in Galle26-Jul-2017Dinesh Chandimal might be missing the Test with pneumonia, Asela Gunaratne may have fractured a thumb, but as far as bad luck goes, no one in this Sri Lanka side has known as long a spell of misfortune as day one’s honest toiler: Nuwan Pradeep.Mishaps, for him, have been both many and memorable. Never far from injury, Pradeep has spent so much time in triage over the last few years, that he could easily have a second family in whichever rehab centre Sri Lanka players use. In the event his behaviour has been more honourable (and let’s be honest, with Pradeep, it probably was), he has made enough tough comebacks now to be ordained the patron saint of busted hamstrings.When he actually plays, let us not forget he does so for Sri Lanka. With non-seaming pitches endlessly served up at home, and team-mates having recently taken to dropping catch after simple catch, even the act of being a Sri Lanka quick seems like something that should be banned by the UN’s Convention Against Torture and Cruel Punishment.Then there are the many specific instances of misfortune. Earlier this year, Pradeep bowled the spell of his life at the Wanderers in Johannesburg, claiming four wickets for one run in a wicked 18-ball burst of seam bowling, but barely received a mention at the end of the day, because Sri Lanka had been resplendently horrendous around that passage of play. It’s just Pradeep’s luck, really, to produce a career-best performance, miss the chance to claim a maiden career five-wicket haul because his captain didn’t give his best bowler a second slip, then have his team crash to an innings-and-infinity defeat.In fact, virtually all of Pradeep’s best performances have come in monumental losses. The four-for at Chester-le-Street last year? Sorry Pradeep, that was in a nine-wicket loss (after Sri Lanka had been asked to follow-on). The four-for in Dunedin in 2015? Nope: 122-run hiding. The four-for against India at the SSC? Try again, 117-run defeat. No one will suggest he has a good average, but while others in this “developing” side seem to be getting worse, his is actually improving slightly. At times, he’s like the one student in the art class who is painting his best work, while everyone else stabs themselves in the eye with the paintbrush.So perhaps the one consolation for Pradeep is that he is more than familiar with the treatment he has received on day one. Having missed the most-recent match with injury, he was immediately effective with the new ball, angling short-of-a-length balls across the left-handed openers; making them play, without letting them open their shoulders. The delivery to dismiss Abhinav Mukund was a Pradeep classic – the kind of ball that first got coaches excited at Sri Lanka’s pace academy. Angled in from around the wicket, it left the batsman slightly, and claimed the edge. The dismissal of Kohli, however, was evidence of the distance he has come as a bowler. The quick, well-directed bouncer has in the past year, been deployed clinically and sparingly, so the remaining arrows in his quiver are sharpened by its menace.Where back in 2015, Pradeep was Sri Lanka’s third-choice seamer at best, he has now worked so diligently at his craft, he is for the first time in his career, gaining a little public admiration. Once, he was the most wayward of Sri Lanka’s quicks, forever leaking four runs an over, even if he did occasionally cause trouble with his seam. On the first day, going at 3.55, he was cheaper even than Rangana Herath, and bowled only six overs fewer. His discipline has improved to such an extent, that he has recently outperformed Lasith Malinga in ODIs.”Even in the Champions Trophy and the Zimbabwe ODIs, Pradeep was bowling very well,” Sri Lanka’s cricket manager Asanka Gurusinha said. “We all realised that at this stage, he is our No. 1 seam bowler. He was the most outstanding bowler out there today.”Save for during Pradeep’s seven-over opening burst, in which he claimed the wicket of Abhinav and conceded 24, he was poorly supported in his remaining spells. The spinners continued to send balls down the legside to feed a multi-fanged, salivating monster that was Shikhar Dhawan’s sweep. Lahiru Kumara’s pitch map looked like debris in the wake of a hurricane. Even Herath let Dhawan get in his head, bowled flat and spread the field.With all three wickets to his name, Pradeep might even claim career-best figures here. Such is his life, Sri Lanka are pelting towards a comprehensive spanking.

The T20 Blast quarter-finals get underway on Tuesday. ESPNcricinfo runs the rule over the eight teams left in the competition

Will Macpherson21-Aug-2017Derbyshire v Hampshire (Tuesday, 6.30pm)
Story so far: Hampshire looked destined for a home quarter until their ruinous last-day defeat to Somerset, so they will have to make do with a trip to Derby. The hosts have been steady in the North Group, and finished with a flourish. They are a diverse side and their imported talent has impressed, particularly on the bowling side, with Matt Henry, Hardus Viljoen and Imran Tahir picking up 45 wickets between them.
In focus: Watch out if Liam Dawson bowls the first over of the innings for Hampshire; in the four games he has done so, that over reads: 5-0, 2-1, 1-1 and 1-1. Canny and parsimonious. Wayne Madsen has regularly done a similar job for Derbyshire. Madsen has had a remarkable season. His 522 runs are the third most in the competition and more than any Derbyshire batsman in one season, ever. He has also 13 wickets, has only failed to take a wicket twice, and has an economy of 7.17.This game should also be a legspin fetishist’s paradise. England have released Mason Crane, whose 11 matches have brought 15 wickets at an economy of just 6.6, and he and Dawson are normally joined in Hampshire’s team by Shahid Afridi, who has 12 and is going at 7.2. For Derbyshire, Tahir has been a revelation. He has 17 wickets, including four for 17 in their last game against Worcestershire.
Key data: Hampshire have the joint-most Finals Day appearances, with six. Derbyshire are the only team among the quarter-finalists never to make it.
Prediction: Hampshire, but not by much

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Colin Ingram has spearheaded Glamorgan’s forceful batting•Getty ImagesGlamorgan v Leicestershire (Wednesday, 6.30pm)
Story so far: Leicestershire flew out the blocks, starting by winning four from four (all on the road). They then went six games without a win, before four straight wins in a week saw them sneak through. Lovely bread, horrible filling in that sandwich. Glamorgan were the opposite: a consistent force in the South Group, with Welsh rain – four matches have been rained off at Cardiff – their only hindrance. They never lost two on the spin.
In focus: Glamorgan’s excellence has been built on brutal batting in high-scoring games. They scored more than 175 in all but one (their chase of 99 in the rain-affected game against Middlesex on Friday) of their seven wins. Colin Ingram is their man: he hit two tons (both in victories where a batsman scored a century for the opposition) and 25 sixes in 11 innings. Meanwhile, none of their bowlers have gone at an economy under 7.8!The key for Leicestershire has been consistency of selection. Seven men played all their group games, while two players featured in 12 and one, the skipper Clint McKay, 11 (that was enough time for him to chalk up 22 wickets). Luke Ronchi’s fast starts and Mark Cosgrove’s canniness at No. 3 are crucial with the bat (they both have 401 runs), while Mathew Pillans (100 runs down the order and 17 wickets) has been a revelation.
Key data: Glamorgan and Leicestershire have met just once in T20 cricket: at Finals Day in 2004 (the Welsh side’s last appearance on the big day). Leicestershire won by 21 runs and went on to beat Surrey in the final. Just two players from that game – Darren Stevens and Brad Hodge – are still playing.

Prediction: Glamorgan’s batting to prove too strong for Leicestershire’s bowling in a high-scoring thriller.

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Riki Wessels has been in fine form for Nottinghamshire•Getty ImagesNottinghamshire v Somerset (Thursday, 6.30pm)
Story so far: The loss of Nottinghamshire’s opening two games felt a distant memory as their batsmen, led by Alex Hales (who ended the groups with a strike-rate of 210), went large. They won eight of their next 11 (with two washouts thrown in) to secure a home quarter with time to spare. Somerset, meanwhile, have been altogether more turbulent. They pipped Sussex to this tie thanks to a mighty, massive victory at Hampshire in their final game, and ended with six wins (at no stage did they string more than two together), six losses and plenty of bad blood on social media.
In focus: Hales was Nottinghamshire’s most eye-catching performer, but his opening partner Riki Wessels scored more runs and was the tournament’s most consistent bat, and had a strike-rate touching 150, too. He scored 28 or more nine times (in 13 innings), including eight on the spin, as well as a 54-ball 110 against Derbyshire early on. Somerset should ignore him at their peril.Somerset are the only team in the last eight without a batsman with 300 runs (indeed Gloucestershire were the only others in the whole competition in that boat), and their selection (and batting order) was very inconsistent – they used a total of 18 players. They will rely heavily on their spinners Roelof van der Merwe and Max Waller, their only two bowlers going at under eight an over.
Key data: Tying Notts down will not be easy at Trent Bridge: the lowest first-innings total there this season was 180, and all six non-DLS games there brought 360 runs, with four of them containing more than 400.
Prediction: Notts should be too strong at home.

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Dominic Sibley returns to his old county after an acrimonious split•Getty ImagesSurrey v Birmingham Bears (Friday, 7pm)
Story so far: Quite how Surrey have a home quarter, no one knows – least of all them. They told the tale of the congested South Group, and were consistently inconsistent: won two, lost two, won two, had two abandoned, then lost three before winning three more. Confused? Us too. Much-changed Birmingham took a while to find their feet but also finished strongly.
In focus: This is the catty clash the neutrals wanted: the Dom Sibley Derby (not words we ever expected to publish). Expect bad blood and south London boos for Sibley after he chose to leave Surrey for Birmingham at the end of the year. Following an inexplicably unpleasant press release (which revealed elements of Sibley’s deal) from Surrey, he left early, with Rikki Clarke returning home a few months ahead of schedule in exchange. Both are available: grab the popcorn.With Ian Bell dropped, Birmingham have a very youthful look alongside their gnarled old Kiwi pros. Sibley, Ed Pollock, Sam Hain and Adam Hose are key batsmen, while Olly Stone is finally fit and Josh Poysden returned well in their final two games. Aaron Thomason is a punchy, talented all-rounder too but the key man remains Jeetan Patel: only McKay has more than his 19 wickets, and his economy of 6.67 is the best of anyone with 16 wickets or more.
Key data: Both Clarke and Sibley have seen a sharp upturn in form since their swaps: Clarke has eight wickets in five games (and economy of 6.47) for Surrey, while Sibley has two fifties in four knocks for Birmingham.
Prediction: Sibley to power Birmingham into a home Finals Day

Sri Lanka have defended scores of less than 250 only four times in their Test history. Every single time, Rangana Herath has been at the centre of it all

ESPNcricinfo staff02-Oct-2017Sri Lanka have defended scores of less than 250 only four times in their Test history. Every single time, Rangana Herath has been at the centre of it all

Irfan Pathan looks back at the years when he was India’s all-round sensation, and where things went wrong

Gaurav Kalra24-Oct-201713:53

‘I’ve changed my mindset this season’

Imran Khan Pathan isn’t a year old yet. His doting father marvels at how he already holds a cricket ball. Imran has two cousin brothers, sons of his uncle Yusuf. They like to bat. But little Imran is inclined to bowl. At least that’s what dad reckons.”New ball, you know, he holds and he does something,” Irfan Pathan says, eyes twinkling. “I don’t know what he does, so, you know, looks like he is going to use his wrist pretty much. I’m just hoping, I’m thinking, that he might be a bowler.”Irfan will be 33 this month. It has been five years since he played an ODI or T20I. Nine since he played a Test. This much time away and in the relentless treadmill that is the modern game, players tend to fade from the public mind. Yet somehow Irfan hasn’t quite become a footnote. Not yet. His social-media feed often explodes with reminders of hat-trick in Karachi, Man-of-the-Match effort in Perth, time when he starred in the final of the World T20 in Johannesburg.He clicks the links sometimes and watches those videos. He sees this guy with a buttery-smooth run-up, shaping an innocuous seeming delivery venomously into an unsuspecting batsman. He sees the twinkle-toed batsman, caressing cover drives and spanking spinners into stands. He sees the good looks, the infectious energy, the almost inevitable ascent to greatness he promised when in his pomp.”Even if I want to forget, you know, my fans won’t let me forget, which is good, which is great,” he muses. “That keeps me going as well.”

There was a time IPL teams would break the bank to ensure he was on their roster. At the last auction, not one paddle went up when his name was called. Why would it?

Irfan has been named captain of Baroda for this domestic season. Their Ranji trophy campaign began with defeat at the hands of Madhya Pradesh in Indore and a draw against Andhra Pradesh in Baroda. Irfan failed with the bat in both innings against Andhra, though the did score 80 against Madhya Pradesh, adding 188 with brother Yusuf, who made a hundred, as they rescued the team after a top-order collapse.Irfan says he has worked hard in the off season to be ready, on his “mindset” more than in training. “I started early this season and I’m doing everything that I could to hopefully achieve my dream in the future,” he says. This season is going to be very, very crucial. I know that I’m – you know, I’m standing on thin ice.”It is a candid admission.Irfan understands Indian cricket stopped waiting on him a while ago. He just didn’t give them enough reason not to. Since his last ODI, 17 List A matches have yielded a total of 19 wickets at 34.10 and 298 runs 24.83. There was a time IPL teams would break the bank to ensure he was on their roster. At the last auction, not one paddle went up when his name was called. Why would it? Nine seasons with four teams had produced mostly underwhelming outcomes: 103 games, 1139 runs at 21.49, 80 wickets at 33.11 and an economy rate of 7.77. Gujarat Lions did call him up as a replacement player deep into the season this year, but he played only one game and did little of note.In long-format matches since his last Test, Irfan has made just 36 First class appearances prior to this domestic season. 1749 runs at 32.38. 120 wickets at 22.95. It is as if cricket has been gone from being all-consuming to something he does from time to time.However, beyond these hardly collar-grabbing numbers, Irfan insists, there lies another story. He laments injuries that surfaced in the off-season months from July to September, caused at times by “over-pushing” himself. A rib fracture after the 2011-12 season, when he had just played for India, hurt so bad he could feel it in his lungs and made him fear for his life. It was followed by a fractured knee, an injury that he looks back on as being caused by extraordinary circumstances.Irfan Pathan is looking to take a last crack at the big time•Getty Images”I was playing a Champions League game, the semi-final,” he remembers. “We lost the game. The same night we took a flight [back to India]. A couple of days in between and I played a three-day game against England. Third day, the last day, I took a flight to Baroda. From the next day onwards, I played a Ranji Trophy game against Karnataka. I scored a hundred in that game, bowled more than 20 overs in an innings, so I played about nine days continuously.”My knee flared up and I got a fracture. So, in ten days I took an international flight, played a T20 game, came to India, I was still jet-lagged, played a three-day game, scored 45 against England, bowled more than 20-25 overs [19 overs], took a flight on the third day, played the Ranji Trophy whole game, and on the last day I got injured. Who plays that? No one plays seven days of continuous first-class cricket. So that was my commitment and eventually I got injured.”That experience made me a person who sees the larger picture, and, you know, made me who I am. So there is no regret, but looking back in terms of, you know, when you said there [has not been much] first-class cricket – because of so many other reasons as well. It’s easy for someone to write that he played less first-class cricket.”I haven’t talked about this but this is what happened before I got injured. So, if not me, even the fittest guy would get like, you know – in terms of energy, people used to call me powerhouse because I can go on the whole day and energy was never an issue, but managing workload sometimes was an issue with me. Sometimes I used to overwork, so that was a main issue and this was happening exactly that way. I needed help as well, and I asked for help and I didn’t get help.”As an old wound is scratched, words of regret come tumbling out. Irfan has heard the commentary that questioned his desire to reclaim his India spot. He knows whispers repeatedly did the rounds that suggested he was always fit when an IPL season came along but “conveniently injured” when his domestic team needed him. It is a narrative that Irfan believes has no basis in reality.

I asked the question to someone: in this little span of time, am I going to have to play so much cricket? I got an answer, ‘If you’re going to play, if you’re going to make a comeback to Test cricket, you play’

“I was regular member of [the side in] one-day cricket,” he says. “I was Man of the Match in my last match before I got injured. I wanted to make a comeback to Test cricket, so what I was doing? What I did was, came back, took a flight, in nine days I played a three-day game, I played a four-day game. I asked the question to someone that, you know, these are so many days – you know, in this little span of time, [am I going to have to play] so much cricket? I got an answer, ‘If you’re going to play, if you’re going to make a comeback to Test cricket, you play.'”Then I played. I wish I was smart enough not to play, but I didn’t know that I was going to get injured. I think people just sometimes want to say things, they just want to talk without having the real facts.”Beyond the disappointments and regrets, though, there is a monk-like calm in Irfan’s demeanour. As he prepares to attempt another international call-up, he is grateful to have traversed two generations of Indian cricket, to have made 173 appearances across formats for India, to have taken 301 wickets and scored nearly 3000 runs. He wishes his CV included Test match appearances in England, New Zealand and South Africa, where conditions would have assisted his style of bowling, but it wasn’t to be.He likes to turn the TV on but only when he can watch a “competitive match”, especially when the Indian team is playing. These days, he keeps a particularly close eye on young Hardik Pandya, also an allrounder from Baroda, and smiles wistfully when asked if he can relate to the “buzz” around Pandya; to the swooning admiration that chases this gifted player who can bat, bowl and field, and do it with a flair similar to a one-time tyro from the same town.”His bowling is going to be very, very crucial for his career to go ahead, because, you know, he’s not a guy who bowled from a very young age,” Irfan says. “He started bowling late. He was batting, but for him to be fit it’s going to be the most important [to] keep all the other things aside which he likes to do, he needs to just fully focus on cricket. If he does that for the next five to seven years, he won’t have to worry.”There has already been a lifetime’s worth of rough and tumble in Irfan Pathan’s unique career, but he is eager to give it one more runaround with all his might. If it doesn’t work out, well, so be it. Little Imran already seems inclined to hoop it both ways. And his dad thinks his wrist position is pretty good already.

Rashid Khan on learning valuable lessons from being attacked in the IPL

Interview by Vishal Dikshit09-May-20182:54

Rashid Khan talks about Sunrisers Hyderabad ending their losing streak against Mumbai Indians

Where did you learn legspin and pick up your variations from?
I learnt legspin from my [six] brothers. They are all cricket lovers and they all bowl legspin. So I picked it up from them and it came naturally to me. There was one difference in my kind of legspin – I used to bowl quick from the beginning. They noticed that in my bowling and I realised that that kind of bowling and wrong’uns came naturally to me.Was there any coach who helped you develop your bowling?
Whichever coaches I worked with, not one of them tried to change my style of bowling or my action. They would always give me confidence but nobody tried to change me. The head coach with our Under-19 team, Dawlat Ahmadzai, supported me a lot and told me I had a lot of talent and that I would go far. He gave me a lot of confidence. Otherwise, there was no coach as such who taught me the technicalities like how to hold the ball, how should the action be, how to release the ball, etc. All this came naturally to me.How do you keep up this process of teaching yourself when you are playing in different leagues across the world and for Afghanistan?
I work on most things on my own. Like, these days I’m here for the IPL, so I train in the nets and try different variations on my own. There are some variations I’m still trying in the nets and haven’t used in matches yet. I’m working on them in the nets.No matter where I practise in the nets, whether in Greater Noida or Afghanistan, I work on myself on my own and I talk to the coaches about the team’s requirements. Otherwise I don’t really change my action or my bowling speed and no coach asks me to change them either.Was there anything in particular you learnt from Muttiah Muralitharan [Sunrisers bowling coach]?
 When he saw my action and everything, he told me, “You are absolutely perfect, and you don’t need to change anything.” He talks to me about spot bowling – focus on where I want to pitch the ball, the spot I want to target. Second thing he always tells me is that I have to remain relaxed and cool even when batsmen hit me for sixes, or even if I take five-six wickets, and that I should bowl according to my plan and targets. “What the batsmen do after that is different. You have to focus on your bowling and apart from the talent you have, you have to remain mentally strong.” That’s what he would tell me again and again. He has shared a lot of his experience with me and says that once you become mentally strong, it will help you in a lot of situations.

LeagueMWBBIEcoS EcoSRDot%IPL24303-196.856.0518.840.42BPL15193-135.313.7418.947.32BBL11183-205.654.2314.642.42CPL12143-155.824.6420.052.50S Eco = Smart economy rate, one of a new set of metrics by ESPNcricinfo to accurately assess T20 performanceWhat did you tell yourself after Chris Gayle and Suresh Raina smashed you in two consecutive IPL matches? You said later that you had bowled too full in those matches. How did you come to realise that and how did you work on it?
I went and spoke to the coaches and I watched my videos with the analyst after those two matches [against Kings XI Punjab and Chennai Super Kings]. So I saw that I had bowled too full, and the coaches also saw it, but they said it was nothing to worry about. They said that the only problem was that I had bowled too full and the batsmen had connected the shots well. So I was advised that if I bowled back of a length, batsmen will find it hard to attack me. So I did some spot bowling after that and when I came to the Mumbai nets for the next match, my plan was to bowl on a good length. If the batsmen were going to hit me despite that, that was another thing. So that was my mindset.Which Sunrisers coach did you speak to about all this?
All three coaches spoke to me – Tom Moody, VVS Laxman and Muralitharan. They all said the same thing – that everyone goes through ups and downs, and this is how you will learn. Something like this had never happened to me before, so it was good for me because I got to learn from this and it will help me prepare for the future.The three coaches and the captain supported me in the nets. They asked me to bowl a bit shorter so that batsmen would not be able to attack me easily. So that turned out to be successful.Since the two batsmen who had attacked you were left-handers, did you try to correct your strategy in the nets against a left-hander like Shikhar Dhawan or someone else?
No, no, that wasn’t on my mind at all, that I hadn’t bowled well to a lefty. My focus was on the spot bowling I did for three-four overs. I was confident that if I bowled on the right spot, nobody would be able to take me for runs. One or two performances don’t really pull you down or make you a bad bowler. My focus was to bowl the right lengths. I bowled with that mindset and [said] the rest would take care of itself. Whether I was bowling to a righty or lefty, I wanted to bowl in the right spots against Mumbai Indians and later. I bowled to and dismissed Krunal Pandya in that match, so I knew things wouldn’t be tough for me if I bowled in the right areas.The statistics say that you have a much better record against right-hand batsmen than against left-hand ones. Do these things make a difference to you?
I prefer bowling to righty batsmen over lefties. I bowl the wrong’un much better to righties. I still enjoy bowling to lefties, especially when I beat them with the wrong’uns, whether I get a wicket or not. Otherwise, I enjoy bowling to both kind of batsmen. But I don’t feel that “Oh, a lefty or righty is on strike now” and do things differently.Sometimes there are days when things don’t go your way – maybe the wicket is not supporting you and batsmen sometimes hit your good deliveries also. I just try to learn from them and take the positives out of them and try not to repeat my mistakes.’One or two performances don’t really pull you down or make you a bad bowler’•BCCISince you learn mostly by yourself, which legspinners do you like to watch on TV or on YouTube?
 I have watched a lot of Shahid Afridi and Anil Kumble because both of them were quick in the air and were accurate. I still watch some of their videos.Have there been any legspinners you have met and talked to during the IPL or in other T20 leagues
 You meet a lot of people here and share ideas with them. Recently I met [Ish] Sodhi, so we also shared our ideas and experiences.Do you train differently depending on which T20 league you’re bowling in, or if you’re bowling in international cricket?
When I train, no matter where I am, my focus is on my length and to bowl well. Say if I bowl 100 balls, I try to calculate what percentage of those I bowled in good areas and how many in bad areas. It also depends on where I’m bowling, so I have to adjust my lengths according to the conditions also. So I prepare, discuss strategies with the coaches, practise in the nets, and bowl accordingly.Whom do you discuss things with usually?
With the senior players and the coaches. In the IPL I talk to Shikhar Dhawan, our captain, Kane Williamson, Manish Pandey, Yusuf Pathan. Mostly with those who have played here a lot. So I ask them how to bowl to which batsmen, how to bowl on certain pitches, so these kinds of ideas help a lot.Which phase of the match do you enjoy bowling the most in – Powerplay, middle overs or the death?
I enjoy bowling in all phases. You get only four overs in a T20 match so I put in my best into each of those. A lot of times captains ask me when I’d like to bowl. So I just tell them, “Whenever you need me, I’m ready to bowl, whether it’s in the beginning or at the end.” So it could be any point of time in the game – I’m always ready.