Another Turf.

Sabina Park, Kingston, Jamaica showed no one ‘likes’ facing a good fast bowler.

‘Ishant Sharma produced high speeds and awkward bounce from all the sweet spots on the pitch’ observed AR Hemant on Yahoo! Cricket. And he got 3 wickets to show for it. He is still not the same Ishant Sharma who bowled flat out in Australia a couple of seasons ago. He is capable of sustained pace as well as intelligent variation. Then came injury, lay off, and a fall in form. Straight away he turned into a line and length bowler. And the promising pace –bowler who could terrorise Ricky Ponting, was looking quite pedestrian. Thank God! that he rediscovered his pace.

Praveen Kumar could bowl faster than he has hitherto displayed. Swing-bowling got him three wickets, good. But what about speed?. Kapil Dev was once termed a ‘slippery’ bowler by the Aussies. He was clocking just around 81 miles per hour. He got plenty of wickets all right, including an 8 wicket-haul in one innings. It must be remembered that he was setting a trend for Indian pace bowlers at that time. Then followed a stream of bowlers who enjoyed bowling as quick as they could. Srinath, Zaheer Khan, Ashish Nehra, Munaf Patel, R.P.Singh, Sreesanth. But…

Injury-prone, and often ‘guided’ by defensive Captains, these bowlers slowed down perceptibly to a point where a legendary West Indies fast bowler quipped that Praveen Kumar has become a spinner!

Reality is, Indian cricket does not encourage pace bowlers. It waits for them to slow down, exhorts them to become line-and-length bowlers who may restrict batsmen, then let the spinners snare out the batsmen. Any wickets they get are a ‘bonus’.

There is ample proof of this tendency. Srinath never got the new ball till Kapil retired. Munaf did not get a place till he had slowed down.

Now, Varun Aaron, touching a healthy 88 mph or more did not get selected for the Windies tour. Too young, our Board will tell us. He has to learn to control the ball better. His time will come. Meanwhile ,he’ll slow down, learn a few variations, and to respect the opponent batsmen enough not to go too hard at them. And become another medium-pacer who’ll prise out wickets after much plotting. A Shoaib from across the border, a Malinga from a little island down south, a Thomson or a Shane Bond from farther South striking fear in the hearts of batsmen is not for us. A stump splintered in half at impact… a batsman bewildered and beaten for sheer pace…

When will the Indian Selectors pick a Varun Aaron and let him bowl at bruising pace? When will the Indian team have 3 FAST bowlers , all terrorizing the rival batsmen? If Ishant and Praveen can combine well, what may Ishant and Varun Aaron do?

Especially on another turf…