He says he waits patiently for his chances and, at the Wankhede, he made the most of the one he got – despite only five minutes’ notice

Firdose Moonda22-Oct-2023Five minutes before Aiden Markram walked out at the Wankhede to toss in place of Temba Bavuma, Reeza Hendricks found out his name had been added to the team sheet. That’s not an exaggeration for dramatisation’s sake. That is exactly how it happened, according to the man himself.”It was literally five minutes before the toss; coach came up to me and said, ‘You’re in,’ and I said, ‘I’m in! Okay cool, let’s go,’ and that’s exactly how I found out,” Hendricks told the media afterwards. “I obviously had to scramble and get myself into a good mindset to play the game.”There are unanswered questions about why Hendricks was unaware that Bavuma was not well and why he wasn’t put on standby before the team arrived at the ground, or at some point during the warm-ups, which Markram said Bavuma tried to brave through. If Markram knew Bavuma was struggling, it would seem only reasonable that the player who would have to replace him – Hendricks – should have known that too. Especially given the importance of the match, which was South Africa’s fourth of the group stage and first since losing to Netherlands.Perhaps in the coming days we will know more about the sudden onset of Bavuma’s illness and its seriousness. What we know for now is that he had to leave the ground about an hour into the game and watched a match that took place at a venue he dreamt of playing in from the team hotel. He will get another opportunity to emulate his idol, Sachin Tendulkar, if he is well enough on Tuesday, when South Africa play Bangladesh at the same ground.We also know that Hendricks, who was drafted into the side at the last of last minutes, was able to compose himself quickly enough in the circumstances to score a confident 85 in his first fifty-over appearance in over a month and only his fourth ODI this year. “It was quite challenging,” Hendricks conceded. “I felt everything was quite rushed for about an hour and a half. I had to somehow try to calm myself down and obviously they bowled well upfront so that didn’t help either. Luckily I got settled and then things started to fall into place quite easily.”Hendricks watched as Quinton de Kock slammed the first ball through point for four and then nicked behind off Reece Topley the next ball. He watched Rassie van der Dussen come in, under some pressure after playing a reverse sweep straight to a Dutch fielder a few days ago, and approach England’s bowlers with caution. He watched 13 balls before he scored his first run, a stunning square drive to get his first runs of the tournament. There would be more, including the first six of the innings, off a Mark Wood cutter, and two down the ground off Joe Root, as well as a pantheon of pulls. Together with van der Dussen, he laid the launchpad for Heinrich Klaasen and the rest… well, you know what happened.That Hendricks can play is obvious to anyone. How long he will continue to play in the ODI team is the point of discussion.Historically, South Africa have applied a principle of preferential treatment for the incumbent, which means if a player missed a match, a series or even a few months with an injury or illness, they slot back into the starting XI when available. Keshav Maharaj is the most recent example and re-established himself as the first-choice spinner after returning from a ruptured Achilles. That means when Bavuma recovers, Hendricks will be back to the bench.That’s not an unfamiliar position to him after there was also no space for him in South Africa’s T20 side at last year’s T20 World Cup, despite him scoring four successive half-centuries in the format three months before the tournament. The reason? Bavuma returned from an elbow injury and, as the appointed captain, had to take his place in the team.Then, the situation was tense because Bavuma was in poor T20 form and has since stepped down from the leadership of the T20I side. Now, it is not quite the same. Bavuma averages 63.27 in ODIs this year and has scored three hundreds in crucial games. His World Cup returns so far are modest – 59 runs from three innings – but he led South Africa to two wins in their first two games. Although he lacks experience in India and has only played four ODIs in the country, he approaches the game as a scholar and his tactical acumen as captain has been widely praised. He is expected to be back in the side as soon as he returns to full health and, for now, there isn’t much arguing against that.Hendricks’ position is further complicated because South Africa have no other way to make room for him. The balance of the current side cannot accommodate seven specialist batters without leaving them a bowler short no matter which way you try to juggle it. They need Marco Jansen in the allrounder role at No.7 with three quicks and a spinner or two of each. While Markram is a bowling option, South Africa are unlikely to go in with four specialists and expect a full 10 overs from him in every match and Hendricks, who also bowls offspin, has only sent down seven overs in his ODI career.At least, this is not something Hendricks is completely unused to. He has never been a regular in the team and has become accustomed to his role as a back-up and approaches it philosophically. “It’s challenging but you have to make peace with the situation and see how things unfold. I have to try and control what I can and that means me being ready when the opportunity arises,” he said. “It doesn’t matter how it comes but I’m training every day, making sure I am on top of my game, controlling what I can and making sure I wait patiently for the opportunity to come. There’s no point beating around the bush and being hard on yourself. I try to stay in a good frame of mind and, when the opportunity comes, to make sure I am on top of my game.”On that front, he gets full marks. With a five-minute warning, he played an innings that set the tone for a statement win over England and put South Africa in a situation most teams would be only too happy to deal with: a problem of plenty. How they solve it could define this World Cup campaign.

They’ve not been as dominant as the previous Australian teams, but they’ve fought hard and have found a way to win – which is as Australian as it can get

Osman Samiuddin18-Nov-2023In the simple, inarguable fact of Australia making the final of this World Cup, this has been a very Australian campaign. They have been here seven times before after all, and are arriving on the back of an eight-game winning streak. For anyone with even passing interest in this sport, this is familiar territory. Australia? Where else would you expect them to be right now?But it has been a very Australian campaign not in the way of the best-remembered Australian surges. Sure, they have won eight on the trot, but it’s not been with the aura of their dominant, flawless campaigns of 2003 or 2007. No, this run has highlighted that other Australianism, that thing that reminds you of German football teams of the past; the thing for which there absolutely must be a long German word that describes the ingrained refusal to lose a game, to never knowingly be beaten until the last wicket has been taken, ingrained so deep that it turns a loss inside out into a win.Because littered right through this winning streak are periods of extreme vulnerability punctuated by that very thing, by moments that now, in hindsight, gather together to form whatever might become that German word.Related

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Such as when Sri Lanka were cruising along at 125 for no loss in Lucknow just over a month ago. Australia were already 0-2 from their opening games, chastening defeats both, before Pat Cummins brought himself back, knocked over both openers and Sri Lanka lost 10 for 83.Or Marcus Stoinis doing likewise to Pakistan’s openers and throttling what had been an ominous start to a mammoth chase in Bengaluru in the very next game.Or, despite having one less fielder on the boundary in Dharamsala for the last over against New Zealand, conceding five wides and bowling one in the slot and one a thigh-high full toss to Jimmy Neesham, somehow scraping through to a five-run win (and Australia have rarely looked as vulnerable to conceding 19 in a last over to lose as they did in that game).Nobody needs reminding of Glenn Maxwell’s epic 201* and the circumstances from which it was forged, though do recall the moment of his dropping by Mujeeb Ur Rehman. All batters, at least one day, make opponents pay for dropping them, but somehow it never feels as cruel and excruciating as a reprieved Australian batter makes it feel – Mujeeb, Usama Mir in Bengaluru last month, and Herschelle Gibbs last century all deserve a kinder place in our hearts.You might need reminding of Adam Zampa’s last-ditch intervention in Ahmedabad against England. Australia needed to win that game but were rarely in control, until Zampa smashed a 19-ball 29, added 38 with Mitchell Starc. and turned an innings that might have folded for 250 into something 300-ish. They won that by 33.

Cummins doesn’t have the scowl or snarl of past Australian captains and neither does the team. But that only ever supplemented the aura of those great sides, it didn’t create it. That came from how good those players were and all their achievements

And how about that Josh Inglis, fairly anonymous World Cup behind him, turning up to douse the heat of a semi-final no less with an ice-cool and under-celebrated 28? In some ways that was the most Australian thing of this campaign; slightly unheralded player who didn’t start the tournament, becoming a little bit of a hero, proving that all of them are in it together, and any of them are capable of doing this.It speaks both to the strengths and weaknesses of this campaign because take them all out and they have been, as the kids might say, a pretty mid team. A collective batting average that is fourth best, a collective pace-bowling average that is fifth-best; the fifth-best batting average in the powerplay – though, importantly, the second-best strike rate; third-best batting average in the middle overs but fifth-best strike rate; fourth-best bowling average in the middle overs, the sixth-best economy; third-best bowling average at the death, fifth-best economy.In some ways, the unevenness of performance has mirrored the World Cup of their captain. More than anything, Cummins has looked a little spent. Which should not be surprising given the draining assignments he has overseen, and that only one fast bowler – Matt Henry – has bowled more overs than him in international cricket this year.Cummins brings such strong leading-man energy, though, that it’ll never not be odd seeing him come on first change (even after doing it 55 times in his 87 ODIs) and do the grunt work after the powerplay, effectively the economy class of bowling phases. Given what Josh Hazlewood and Starc bring with the new ball, though, it’s difficult to have it any other way. But it adds to the impression that this format hasn’t always brought us the best of Cummins.2:34

Cummins: Have to be brave with variations in India

Instead, like his team he has stepped up in the space of these small, critical moments. The double-strike against Sri Lanka (and the castling of Kusal Perera was a thrilling reminder of his quality), the unbeaten 12 in the chase against Afghanistan, and the catch of Quinton de Kock in the semi-final, part of a fierce Australian fielding performance in the powerplay. If anything, in a strange, understated way these little bits have added to his status as leader.He doesn’t have the scowl or snarl of past Australian captains and neither does the team. But that only ever supplemented the aura of those great sides, it didn’t create it. That came from how good those players were and all their achievements. As well, of course, as that Australianness, however ill-defined it remains. That is true and alive in this squad, seven of whom, remember, have won an ODI World Cup.”Yeah, I think with experience, and fortunately some of that experience is playing in World Cups where we’ve been dominant,” Cummins said. “We’ve won before. We’ve had to fight for every win, but we’ve found a way to win. And different players have stood up at different times. So, I think taking that confidence, knowing that we don’t have to be at our absolute best to challenge any team we can find a way through it.”They stand now on the cusp of something monumental. Defeat India in Ahmedabad on Sunday and it will mean that a chunk of this group will have won two World Cups, a T20 World Cup only two years ago, the World Test Championship, and retained an Ashes series this year.Whichever way you cut that, that’s about as Australian as you can get.

It has looked like Australia have a mental stranglehold over New Zealand, but Henry has suffered no such affliction

Alex Malcolm09-Mar-2024Matt Henry has a 10cm titanium cable and two screws in his spine since a career-saving surgery in 2012.New Zealand should be grateful his spine is made of steel. He has carried his country on his back and dragged them back into the second Test with a sensational seven-wicket haul, before Tom Latham and Kane Williamson shared a critical century stand to erase a first-innings deficit and give the hosts a chance of setting Australia a tricky fourth-innings chase.Henry’s contribution was mighty. There were times when he looked like a one-man attack as runs flowed with ease from the other end. Australia’s batters looked under little threat at one end, yet when they faced Henry at the other, the Hagley Oval pitch looked like a minefield and he was near-on unplayable.Related

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“An incredible effort. Outstanding performance really,” Williamson said. “His style of bowling on surfaces that have offered a little bit makes life quite difficult. It moves late and certainly the Australian bowlers do it very well as well. It was great for Matt to make such a valuable contribution. It’s important we try and back that up.”Henry spoke on the first night of copying Josh Hazlewood’s day-one blueprint on his way to bagging three of Australia’s top four.He doubled down on day two with some impeccable bowling. He forced a mistake from nightwatcher Nathan Lyon to have him caught at slip. He then pinned Mitchell Marsh lbw for a duck with one that nipped back in a touch. Later, as Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins clubbed boundaries at the other end to push Australia’s lead towards 100, he was able to prise them both out. He had Starc caught behind with one angling in and nipping away before trapping Cummins with a clever yorker as he walked down the pitch at him.The help he got from the other end was mainly from Australia. Alex Carey gifted his wicket to Glenn Phillips again before the latter turned to Superman flying high to his right at gully to snare a one-handed screamer to dismiss Marnus Labuschagne after he’d lashed a cut shot off Tim Southee.

“He got some great rewards and has been bowling beautifully, not just in Test cricket but all formats. So it’s great to see all the opportunities that he’s getting, and he’s certainly maximising those”Kane Williamson on Matt Henry

Henry richly deserved his seven-wicket haul given all that he has been through. Beyond the surgery early in his career, he has been plagued by other injuries over the last decade. Then, when he has been fit, he has had limited opportunities with Southee, Trent Boult, Neil Wagner and Kyle Jamieson all ahead of him at various times.”He’s spent a lot of time carrying the drinks and being in and around the group without actually getting a lot of opportunity,” Williamson said. “He’s a real leader with the ball and has had a couple of fantastic performances already in this series. If there’s something in the wicket, he’s certainly a guy that’s going maximise that.”He bowls such a great length and moves it both ways. A similar nature I suppose, a slightly different trajectory, to the Aussie bowlers in terms of their skill sets and moving the ball off the seam both ways.”He got some great rewards and has been bowling beautifully, not just in Test cricket but all formats. So it’s great to see all the opportunities that he’s getting, and he’s certainly maximising those.”Matt Henry was breathing fire with the ball as well as in his celebrations•AFP/Getty ImagesHenry now has 15 wickets for the series and has caught Australia’s batters off guard. They would not have viewed him as a major threat given his previous returns against them. In three Test matches against Australia before the series, he had figures of 4 for 440 from 127 overs. His previous outing against them in Christchurch had yielded 0 for 134 from 41 overs.But he now wishes he could take this Hagley Oval pitch with him wherever he goes, having taken 28 wickets at 15.85 including two seven-wicket hauls in his last four outings.There has been a fear during this series that Australia have a mental stranglehold over the Black Caps and that repeated past failures have spooked them despite their opponents being vulnerable.Henry has suffered no such affliction. His steel spine and his steely resolve have given New Zealand hope.

And how many times have teams passed 400 twice in a Test, like India did in Rajkot?

Steven Lynch27-Feb-2024How often has a five-Test series been tied at 2-2 going into the last match? asked Kerry Hamilton from England
This question was obviously sent when England looked likely to win the fourth Test in Ranchi – but India’s close-run victory after an absorbing match there means there have still been only six five-Test series that were all square at 2-2 going into the final match.Three were Ashes series, all of them in Australia. In 1884-85, England won in Melbourne to win 3-2. Ten years later, in 1894-95, England again won in Melbourne to pinch the series: in both of those they had won the first two Tests but lost the next two. And England won the first two matches again in 1936-37, only for Australia – captained by Don Bradman – uniquely to win the last three, including another decider in Melbourne.England had a similar experience at home in 1955, when South Africa recovered from 2-0 down to 2-2, only for England to clinch the series at The Oval. And India have twice recovered to 2-2 only to lose the decider: they lost the final Test to West Indies in Bombay in 1974-75, then three seasons later in Australia went down 3-2 when the home side won the final match in Adelaide.The six-Test series between England and West Indies in 1995 was level at 2-2 after four matches, but the last two were both drawn.Anyway, to anticipate another question after the result in Ranchi, there have been only three previous five-Test series – the most recent well over 100 years ago – that a team won 4-1 after losing the first match. All three were Ashes series: Australia won 4-1 at home in 1897-98, and repeated the feat in the next series down under in 1901-02, then England turned the tables in 1911-12.India passed 400 in both innings of the third Test against England. How rare is this? asked Vinod Nair from India
India made 445 and 430 for 4 declared in the third Test against England in Rajkot earlier this month. It was only the 11th instance of a team reaching 400 in both innings of a Test, something first achieved by Australia (450 and 452) against England in Sydney in 1924-25. The most recent instance before Rajkot was also by India (426 and 412 for 4), against Sri Lanka in Ahmedabad in 2009-10.On Test debut, Lance Klusener took 8 for 64, which remained his career-best innings figures•Rui Vieira/Associated PressThe other instances were by: Australia (411 and 427 for 6 declared) at Trent Bridge vs England in 1938, South Africa (530 and 481) vs England in the timeless Test in Durban in 1938-39, Australia (458 and 404 for 3) vs England at Headingley in 1948, Australia (441 for 5 declared and 425) vs Pakistan in Melbourne in 1972-73, Australia (511 for 6 declared and 460 for 8) vs New Zealand in Wellington in 1973-74, India (407 and 407 for 9 declared) vs Pakistan in Kolkata in 2004-05, Pakistan (588 and 490 for 8 declared) vs India in Faisalabad in 2005-06, and Australia (463 and 401 for 7 declared) vs India in Sydney in 2007-08.Sachin Tendulkar hit seven Test centuries in 2010. Was that the most in a single year? asked Ashli Ahmed from India
Back in 2010 Sachin Tendulkar was the fourth batter to score seven Test centuries in a calendar year, following Viv Richards for West Indies in 1976, Aravinda de Silva of Sri Lanka in 1997, and Australia’s Ricky Ponting in 2006. However, also in 2006, Mohammad Yousuf of Pakistan piled up no fewer than nine centuries, in just 11 Tests, which remains the record.Tendulkar does hold the record for ODIs, with nine in 1998. Sourav Ganguly made seven in 2000, David Warner seven in 2016, and Rohit Sharma seven in 2019, five of them in that year’s World Cup.In all, Tendulkar made 12 international hundreds in 1998. Ponting scored 11 in 2003, and Virat Kohli 11 in both 2017 and 2018. For that list, click here.I noticed that Saurabh Tiwary was never out during his international career. He made 49 runs – has anyone made more without being dismissed? asked Paresh Firake from India
Saurabh Tiwary played three ODIs for India in 2010-11, when he was only 20, and scored 49 runs without being dismissed. Four players have scored more: leading the way is the Pakistan offspinner Afaq Hussain, who scored 66 runs in two Tests in the early 1960s without getting out.Pakistan-born Mohammad Adnan scored 60 runs without being out in five T20Is for Saudi Arabia in 2019, while Yasir Mehmood made 55 in four T20Is for Cyprus in 2021. And Faiz Fazal, who announced his retirement earlier this month, played a solitary one-day international for India – against Zimbabwe in Harare in June 2016 – and scored 55 not out.I noticed that Keith Stackpole took his best bowling figures on debut, and never improved them in 42 further Tests. Has anyone had more matches than that? asked Craig Tyson from Australia
You’re right that Keith Stackpole recorded his best Test bowling figures – 2 for 33 – on debut against England in Adelaide in 1965-66. Actually he only took 13 further wickets in 42 more matches.Among those who took at least ten wickets in Tests, only two men played more often than Stackpole without improving their debut performance. The South African allrounder Lance Klusener took 8 for 64 in his first Test, against India in Kolkata in 1996-97, and did not better that in 48 further matches. And England’s Wally Hammond took 5 for 36 on debut, against South Africa in Johannesburg in 1927-28, and won 84 more caps without improving on that. Hammond is remembered now chiefly as a batter, scoring 7249 runs in Tests – but he was a handy bowler, especially early in his career, and finished with 83 wickets.Use our feedback form, or the Ask Steven Facebook page to ask your stats and trivia questions

The Sunrisers Hyderabad fast bowler talks about how he has found success on flat pitches, his new variations, and what it’s like to be captained by Pat Cummins

Interview by Deivarayan Muthu04-May-2024From being a yorker specialist, T Natarajan has evolved into a more versatile bowler who now has the on-pace and slower bouncers in his repertoire. In an IPL season where bat has dominated ball like never before, Natarajan has been so impressive with his defensive skills that he even bowled a triple-wicket maiden. The left-arm seamer was “unlucky” to miss out of India’s squad for the T20 World Cup, according to former Sunrisers Hyderabad coach Tom Moody, but he continues to front up to bowl the difficult overs for his franchise. Natarajan spoke to us about the challenges of being a bowler this IPL, Pat Cummins’ leadership, and bowling to MS Dhoni at Chepauk, among other things.When you, Heinrich Klaasen and Co visited a mall in Hyderabad, a lot of people were chanting your name and Klaasen’s. Are you enjoying the reception you’re getting in Hyderabad this season?
I was very excited. I don’t think we’ve had this much attention during all these years in Hyderabad. There was a lot of crowd and we got mobbed ( [poor] bowlers? (, too, has given me a lot of confidence to bowl the slower one. I’ve had a chance to work with Bhuvi for seven years. He has always advised me to not take too much pressure and keeps telling me I have all the skills as a bowler. Even after the end of a match, I sit down with him and try to rectify the mistakes I have made in the match. All of this has helped me execute my variations.You also did well for Tamil Nadu in the Syed Mushtaq Ali and Vijay Hazare tournaments. How did that help you prepare for the IPL?
Yes, the white-ball tournaments went well for me, but the focus has been more on fitness than my bowling in the lead-up to the IPL. I missed the Ranji Trophy because of some pain in my knee. I played the practice game before Tamil Nadu’s first Ranji match [in early January], but I couldn’t play and went back to rehab.”Pat Cummins gives me a lot of freedom, and in terms of communication with the entire bowling attack, he is very strong. He has told me: ‘Don’t worry, whatever happens, I’m there for you'”•Associated PressHow did you deal with being on the sidelines once again?
I’ve worked with Shyam Sundar [the current SRH physio] for ten years and he knows my body well. I also trained regularly at the TNCA and used their gym facilities to be in good shape. My recovery was: gymming one session, training at Chepauk one session, and bowling one session. Also, whenever I need something with my bowling or fitness, I seek inputs from Sreenath Aravind, the former Karnataka left-arm seamer who is now the bowling coach of Baroda. He’s my bowling coach. Even during the IPL, I’m in regular touch with him about my bowling.I have to be patient with the rehab, though. I’ve had three surgeries, so I started from scratch, and it has been going well so far in the IPL. Touch wood!You often discuss fields with Cummins during games. How has his captaincy empowered the team and especially the bowling attack?
He gives me a lot of freedom, and in terms of communication with the entire bowling attack, he is very strong. I feel he understands my mindset as a bowler, so it’s a big plus that he is my captain. To start with, I will go with my plans and strengths. If I get confused, I have a chat with him and get more clarity. He has told me: “Don’t worry, whatever happens, I’m there for you.” I’m a quiet person, sometimes I don’t even speak much with Indian players. But I’ve become very attached to Pat Cummins. Obviously, [I’m] delighted to play under a captain who has won world titles.What’s it like to bowl to someone like Klaasen in the nets?
I’ve bowled to him a few times in practice matches – both in 2024 and 2023. Nets is a closed space, but yes, any bowler, including myself, fears bowling to someone like Klaasen. He’s hitting the ball long and far. Too long and too far! It’s a learning process for me too. I can understand his strengths and use that information when I come up against him as an opponent.”After three years, there was chatter around my potential [India] selection. Not being selected for the T20 World Cup hasn’t disturbed me. I always believe that whatever is meant to happen will happen”•BCCIYou came up against CSK for the first time in the IPL at Chepauk this season. How did you keep calm while bowling to MS Dhoni when the crowd was screaming and dancing to the Rajinikanth song ?
Only now that you’re telling me do I realise that they played that song (). I had to focus on my job and my execution against him. There was also a lot of dew, but I’ve played a lot of cricket at Chepauk, so I had the belief that I can even execute with the wet ball. I haven’t bowled to him in the IPL at Chepauk, but on other grounds I’ve bowled a set of four-five decent balls to him. My mindset was that I shouldn’t make any errors.Sameer Rizvi didn’t play the game against SRH at Chepauk. But do you recall coming up against him while playing Uttar Pradesh in a thriller in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy last October?
Yes, I remember it was a very close game. Tamil Nadu had scored only 140 [146] and I bowled a tight 19th over, taking the wicket of Dhruv Jurel. It was a good pitch and once the sun was out, the ball came onto the bat in Dehradun. It also had something for the bowlers. I hope we can play all games on that pitch (laughs). To start the domestic season like that was a confidence-booster. It gave me self-confidence for the rest of the season. Rizvi scored 75, but despite him being not out, it was a satisfying feeling for us to win the game.When you burst onto the scene in Tamil Nadu, you used to swing the ball in sharply. Did the swing disappear somewhere along the way?
I believe I can still get inswing. Even during the Vijay Hazare Trophy, I got wickets with the inswinger. These days, however, the new ball swings for just one or two overs in T20 cricket, and when I come to bowl in the last over of the powerplay in T20 cricket, there is no swing.Actually, there is no swing for any bowler in this IPL. The wickets have been like that. I think we’ve played about nine games, but the ball hasn’t swung much. Not just for SRH but for most of the teams. But yes, even during practice, I try to swing the new ball and it has been coming out nicely.”Bhuvi bhai [Bhuvneshwar Kumar] keeps telling me I have all the skills as a bowler. Even after the end of a match, I sit down with him and try to rectify the mistakes I would have made in the match”•BCCIHave you had an opportunity to pick the brains of the other left-arm seamers, like Marco Jansen or Fazalhaq Farooqi?
I’ve travelled with Jansen and Farooqi for two-three years. Farooqi can bowl a lot of slower balls and Jansen can get swing naturally. Jansen also bowls a lot of inswingers, so I try to pick that up from him. All four – Farooqi, Jansen, [Jaydev] Unadkat and Akash [Singh] – have different styles. So, during training I try to learn off them and I’ve also shared my experiences with them.Given your recent form and excellent defensive skills at the death, did you expect to be picked for the upcoming T20 World Cup?
Firstly, I was happy to even be part of the selection conversation. I have to thank God for that. After three years, they [selectors] are considering me and there was chatter around my potential selection. Whether I’m selected or not, it’s not in my control. To be even part of the discussion is an achievement for me. If you want to climb to the top of a building, you have to take one step at a time. My focus is to execute well and help SRH win games. Not being selected for the World Cup hasn’t disturbed me. I always believe that whatever is meant to happen will happen.You have a stretch of home games coming up. Are you relieved that you will have some cushion to work with on a bigger ground?
Oh yes, very, very happy that we have games coming up on a bigger ground in Hyderabad. Bigger ground – that’s the key. Home conditions are an advantage for any team. We will have to assess the wicket, but we can use the boundaries to our advantage if we can execute well. We hope that we can do well, as a bowling attack and as a team, in these conditions.

With Klaasen and Miller set, the equation was seemingly in their favour – only to meet with crushing disappointment once again

Matt Roller29-Jun-2024It was the over that should have decided the final. It was clinical, destructive and dismissive: Heinrich Klaasen picked his moment to hit the 15th over of South Africa’s chase for 24 runs, ruthlessly targeting Axar Patel. It was stunning hitting in any context, let alone on the biggest stage in T20 cricket.Klaasen calculated that this was his chance to grasp a game that was in the balance. He lofted the first ball back over Axar’s head, then had the presence of mind to leave two wides alone. Two enormous sixes followed: the first, measured at 99 metres, hit the roof of the Greenidge and Haynes Stand at midwicket; the second, measured at 103m, landed in the Garfield Sobers Pavilion.After a violent launch over extra cover for four more and another for two, Klaasen had iced the chase: South Africa needed 30 runs off the last 30 balls with six wickets in hand. At first glance, it was the unloseable game: even if they decided to block Jasprit Bumrah’s final two overs out, they would still be favourites with either Klaasen or David Miller at the crease.Related

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Rohit: It's not what we did today, it is what we have done for three-four years

Magic moments – Bumrah, Klaasen and SKY go flash, bam, alakazam

By now, you know what happened next. Forty-five minutes later, South Africa’s players sat disconsolately on the Kensington Oval outfield, waiting for their runners-up medals. Few words passed their lips. Those final 30 balls brought just 22 runs, four wickets and a single boundary, via Kagiso Rabada’s outside edge. There is no weight heavier than the burden of history.It is never quite as simple as a choke: one team being close to victory does not strip all agency away from the other. India’s bowlers were sensational at the death, none more so than Bumrah. South Africa were rendered shotless by his skill, his final two overs costing only six runs; it left Arshdeep Singh and Hardik Pandya just enough to defend off the other three.But it is impossible to understand the last five overs of this final without acknowledging South Africa’s legacy. This was the first time they had reached this stage of a men’s World Cup in either format, a fact which owed to their repeated failures to win close knockout games – seven times exiting at the semi-final stage. How could it not have weighed on their players’ minds?This team thought it was different, finally overcoming the hurdle of a semi-final and winning countless close games along the way. One problem lingered: in choosing to play five specialist bowlers, South Africa were always vulnerable once they lost a fifth wicket. Against West Indies last week, they scrambled home regardless; in the final, their lack of batting depth proved costly.When Klaasen and Miller played out the 16th over, Bumrah’s third, South Africa needed 26 off the final four: it was a situation loaded in their favour. Time moves quickly in T20 finals and India realised they needed to win it back somehow. It was the mischievous Rishabh Pant who discovered a way to do so: he went down and called on India’s physio for treatment.

“It’s not the first game of cricket that’s been lost with a team needing 30 off 30. India are allowed to bowl well, they’re allowed to field well, they’re allowed to go from that position to a position of strength”Aiden Markram

This allowed Rohit Sharma the chance to rally his players. “The message was very loud and clear to everyone that until the last ball of the game is bowled, the game is not over,” he said. “My job as a captain is to make everyone believe that… Whether we were ahead in the game or behind, we wanted to keep fighting because moments like this will never come again.”It was only a short break, lasting barely three minutes, between the end of the 16th and the start of the 17th over. But it was long enough for the rhythm of the game to change: when Hardik sprayed the first ball of his over full and wide outside off, Klaasen could not quite reach it, and edged a catch through to Pant.This was the moment that the game changed for good, bringing Marco Jansen in at No. 7. It is a trade-off that South Africa have long accepted: rather than relying on part-timers in their top six, they have picked five specialist bowlers in their T20 team and backed their batters to get the job done more often than not.Jansen is not an overpromoted tailender but has been batting one spot too high. Suddenly, everything was on Miller; after he and Jansen exchanged four singles off Hardik’s over, the equation was 22 off 18. He seemed caught in two minds: should he take the responsibility of seeing off Bumrah himself, or get down the other end?The result was the worst of both worlds: two dots, a single which exposed Jansen, an unplayable ball which moved in late to hit leg stump, a firm block by Keshav Maharaj and then a single which kept Miller off strike for the start of the 19th. “Things happened very quickly,” Aiden Markram reflected. “They bowled really well at the back end.”Heinrich Klaasen left the job unfinished•AFP/Getty ImagesBy the time Miller got back on strike after Maharaj blocked, missed and finally connected at the start of the 19th, the equation was 19 off nine balls and India were favourites. He hauled Arshdeep away for two and inside-edged a yorker into the leg side to give Maharaj a free hit, but Arshdeep nailed his yorker to leave 16 required off the last.”A run a ball can go to 10 an over in the space of one over,” Markram said. “Your gameplan as a batter changes. You’re potentially thinking of keeping the ball on the ground, running hard until the job’s done. And then the bowler bowls a good over, and next thing you’d be searching for boundaries and everything changes quickly like that.”By the start of the last over, the plan was simple: swing, and swing hard. Finally, Miller got the ball he was after, a wide full toss from Hardik which he swung down the ground. It hung in the air, swirling towards the press box in the cross-breeze, as Suryakumar Yadav charged after it. He caught it, flicked it back up to himself as he ran over the boundary, and caught it again.Markram “couldn’t watch” as the TV umpire checked to see if he had stepped on the rope. “They were obviously pretty convinced that it was out, and that’s why it was a quick replay,” he said. Rabada edged his first ball for four but the game was up: South Africa only managed one more run off the bat, falling seven short of India’s total.”It’s not the first game of cricket that’s been lost with a team needing 30 off 30,” Markram said. “It’s more that India are allowed to bowl well, they’re allowed to field well, they’re allowed to go from that position to a position of strength. It happens often in this game.” He described the defeat as “gut-wrenching”, saying: “It stings a bit – but it’s good for it to sting.”The manner of this defeat will take some getting over. “When you get really close like that, especially the nature of how the game went, it obviously adds to the emotions,” Markram said.Ahead of the medal presentation, Miller spent 10 minutes by himself in the middle on his haunches; several players were in tears after this brush with immortality.For some, this was their final chance to write a new chapter in South African cricket’s World Cup story: Quinton de Kock’s reaction after his dismissal suggested that this was his final international appearance. Others will be wearing the same scars again in two years’ time, hoping that the ending will finally be different to this one.

Data shows the growing popularity of this line, though the nitty gritty – think angle-of-delivery, or field sets – still needs refining to make it truly influential

Sruthi Ravindranath23-May-2024May 7, Delhi. Khaleel Ahmed was bowling a crucial over for Delhi Capitals against Rajasthan Royals. Sanju Samson was on song, batting on 79 off 38 balls, with RR needing 74 off 36 balls to chase down 222. Khaleel ended up bowling four wides in that over, and none of his legal deliveries were bowled at the stumps. Despite the extras, and despite conceding a boundary, the over only went for 11 though.A user comment on ESPNcricinfo’s ball-by-ball commentary said at the time, “That’s cricket for you… Bowler completely loses the plot, and the over still goes for fewer runs than most in this match.”But did Khaleel actually lose the plot? In all likelihood, he was strategically bowling a wide line to keep Samson from going for the big shots. He missed his lines by fine margins and conceded extras. For someone who’s sixth on the list of bowlers to have bowled the most balls wide outside off stump since IPL 2021, he probably very well knew what he was doing. And, in the end, he went largely unscathed and ended up bowling a match-turning over.In the same game, with the equation down to 37 off 12, Rasikh Salam bowled an eight-run over to RR’s Rovman Powell. The right-arm quick came around the wicket to the right-hand Powell, trying to bowl wide yorkers, which he nailed twice in five attempts. One of the failed attempts resulted in a six, but otherwise he managed to keep the batter quiet.

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An unprecedented number of wides have been bowled in IPL 2024. In 2023, one in every 88.86 balls was a wide, while in 2024, a wide has been bowled every 50.90 balls.The data also shows bowlers have been bowling wider lines, in general, more than ever*. Given run-scoring this season has been at an all-time high, bowlers have had to bowl defensively – think wide yorkers, slow wide bouncers, around-the-wicket wide yorkers, etc – to stay away from the batters’ hitting arc. While this reduces the chances of taking a wicket, it prevents batters from scoring and sometimes even forces an error resulting in a wicket.ESPNcricinfo LtdKKR assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate described it as “anti-skill” bowling, an option to counter aggressive batting in the IPL. He cited the example of how Punjab Kings’ Sam Curran set Phil Salt up, first by bowling short and wide with an off-side field to drag the batter across only to then fire one onto the stumps.Among fast bowlers who have bowled the most wide-outside-off-stump deliveries in the middle and death overs across the last two IPLs is Arshdeep Singh. In the match against CSK in Chennai, Arshdeep stuck to wider lines against MS Dhoni – who feeds on anything straight and full – and denied him access to mid-off and the leg side. He used the wide line to great effect against the high-scoring Sunrisers Hyderabad as well, in Mullanpur, where he finished with figures of 4 for 29. Khaleel has bowled the most wide-outside-off-stump deliveries in IPL 2024 among pacers overall, while Arshdeep, who is second on this list, has the most wickets bowling this line among the tournament’s top-five wicket-takers.ESPNcricinfo LtdBut bowlers have frequently gone too far, literally. The percentage of balls bowled wide outside off has gone from 8.5% in 2023 to 9.2% in 2024. The numbers suggest pacers have bowled a lot more wider lines since the start of the 2023 season but this year, they have also bowled a wide every 40.41 balls – it was 67.03 last season. But that’s a gamble bowlers seem willing to take, which was clearly the case for Khaleel while bowling to Samson. Giving away wides in an attempt to bowl defensively is something captains and coaches aren’t too worried about now, according to former New Zealand left-arm seamer Mitchell McClenaghan, the bowler who has the most off-side wides in T20 history.”Wides are generally okay because what you are trying to achieve when you are bowling wide is you are trying to play with the batter and expect them to try and hit the ball,” McClenaghan told ESPNcricinfo. “Because that’s the game. You know if they leave one out there and it’s inside the wide line, then you win. As a bowling coach nowadays, you’re not concerned too much if they bowl wide because particularly in the last over even if you do bowl one wide outside the wide line, you will often see a batter step across the next ball, which gives you more of a margin. Not many batters are patient enough to let one ball go by without hitting it.”McClenaghan himself used these tactics as much as possible. “I would always rather err on getting outside of the line [of the stumps] because if I got too straight, it ends up in that easy arc for batters to hit,” he said.CSK allrounder-turned-bowling-coach Dwayne Bravo used the around-the-wicket tactic often at the death to deny right-hand batters the big hits. Not surprisingly, Bravo has bowled the most wide-outside-off-stump deliveries in the middle overs and at the death in the IPL. His influence on CSK’s bowlers is very evident: their bowlers have bowled the most wide-outside-off-stump deliveries this season. Tushar Deshpande, who finished as CSK’s top wicket-taker, also has the best economy rate overall when bowling this particular line.ESPNcricinfo LtdOne of the best uses of this line from Deshpande came in the match against SRH at Chepauk. Right-armer Deshpande forced SRH’s two dangerous left-handers – Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma – into slicing the ball towards the longer square boundary with wider lines from over the wicket angling away.Former CSK bowling coach L Balaji explained that having Chepauk as a home ground had to do with CSK’s bowlers employing this line more – the three teams still in IPL 2024 would be turning this around in their heads too, with Qualifier 2 and the final to be played in Chennai.”When you play at Chepauk, the side boundaries, which are bigger than the straighter ones, are a little difficult to access for a batsman,” Balaji said. “So when you have dimensions to play with as a bowler, you have to take the game ‘sideways’. One option is bowling short and making horizontal shots come into play. The other defensive option is taking the ball wider or more towards the heel. You either target the heel or either you target a wide line.”Spinners usually bowl loopy balls outside off stump or more darters towards the leg stump. Fast bowlers use the slower bouncer as an option to take the game sideways, like Bravo [used to]. These options will work at Chepauk but not at most other venues. The square dimensions are around 57-58 metres or 60 metres [at most other grounds]. In Chepauk, you have access to around nearly 72 metres. Those [extra] ten metres make a huge difference when it comes to miscuing. So you have to adjust according to the dimensions of the ground.”That said, the wide line has still been quite expensive this season. Bowlers bowling this line at the death have conceded 14.06 per over. Compared to the wide-of-off-stump line, the (just) outside-of-off-stump line has been 26.26% more economical. This is perhaps because it’s a relatively new trend and bowlers are still working out how best to use and execute it. While Arshdeep’s economy in overs outside the powerplay is 10.21, his economy bowling wide of off goes up to 13.05.ESPNcricinfo LtdSpinners too have tried out this line. Among them, Yuzvendra Chahal has bowled the most wide of off stump deliveries outside the powerplay since IPL 2023, followed by Rahul Chahar and Varun Chakravarthy. “The defensive ball is the offensive ball,” Varun had told after KKR’s match against DC, where he picked up 3 for 33.In that match, he had Rishabh Pant miscue a tossed-up wide delivery and also went on to remove Axar Patel in a similar manner. “I’ve been bowling wide lines and that has also ended up giving me wickets,” he said. “Nothing was happening when I bowl at the stumps. That’s how much the batters have pushed us.” However, Varun, too, has been taken for plenty while employing this line: 15.80 while bowling wide outside off stump, which is almost double his overall economy of 8.20.So how can bowlers make the best use of this line?”There’s probably been quite a lot of runs scored on the wide line because it’s a new concept to a lot of bowlers,” McClenaghan said. “They are used to bowling straight yorkers or at the stumps. If you haven’t bowled wide and you haven’t bowled wide in an open field, or an open net, you don’t know what angle you’re getting hit at.”Bowlers have got to take the time to bowl without the net and try to bowl wide yorkers and see when they miss what line they get hit on, because quite often guys have missed just by a little bit this IPL but they haven’t known what line their fielder needs to be [positioned at for the mis-hit].”

“When you play at Chepauk, the side boundaries, which are bigger than the straighter ones, are a little difficult to access for a batsman. So when you have dimensions to play with as a bowler, you have to take the game ‘sideways'”Former India seamer L Balaji

McClenaghan feels the wide yorker, or a slower version of it, is one skill bowlers need to master. And for that, bowlers also need captains to back them up with the right field settings.”If you know your angles properly, you can have two guys out on the off side, the backward point and extra cover, mid-off up and then you can have one on the leg side square, fine leg up, cow corner and long-on. And that means that you can bowl your wide yorker. But you can also bowl your heel yorker or your slower ball as well. We’re not seeing as many of those split fields because quite often when guys are trying to bowl wide yorkers, they’re bowling just from [over the wicket] and not coming around. That makes it a little bit easier for batters to get in line with the ball and hit them over mid-off, so it means that they have to have mid-off back as well. We’ve seen a few mistakes being made there so that’s small tactics [to get right] as guys are learning their angles.”For McClenaghan, defensive bowling is here to stay. Balaji, meanwhile, believes it should only be the last resort when there’s “nothing you can get out of the pitch”. Both agree that batters will eventually figure out how to attack this line as well.”Batters have a choice to move around the crease,” Balaji said. “They can shift to their base to off stump or they can shift to the base anywhere they want. There is no restriction for the batsman. This makes a huge difference.”Either way, there’s a new tactic in town, and it will be intriguing to see how it plays out at Chepauk in the two big games remaining in IPL 2024, and then at the T20 World Cup that kicks off a week later.*ESPNcricinfo’s logging of this data is subjective.

Their use of (part-time) spinners at Chepauk highlights the randomness of T20

Karthik Krishnaswamy25-May-20241:47

Review: Why were Shahbaz and Abhishek successful?

Until Friday, Sunrisers Hyderabad had the worst record of any spin-bowling team in IPL 2024: the fewest wickets (13), the worst combined average (54.00), and the worst economy rate (11.20). That average and economy rate were magnitudes worse than those of the second-worst spin attacks by those respective measures, Chennai Super Kings (46.78) and Royal Challengers Bengaluru (9.93).On Friday night, in Qualifier 2 against Rajasthan Royals, SRH picked a starting XI that suggested they were looking to bowl as little spin as possible. They picked four specialist quicks, and the bowler in their XI who had sent down the next-most overs behind those four, this season, was Nitish Kumar Reddy, a seam-bowling allrounder.Related

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RR won the toss and chose to bowl. SRH captain Pat Cummins said he would have preferred to bowl first too. Both teams expected dew to play a significant role later in the night and advantage the chasing team. This had been the case in the two playoff games in Ahmedabad – that venue had favoured the chasing side more than any other this season, giving them six wins in eight games.Chennai, the venue for this game, had been the second-best chasing venue, with the team batting second winning five and losing two until Friday.

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Before Friday, only two SRH spinners had breached the 20-over mark in IPL 2024. These two bowlers – Mayank Markande (11.77) and Shahbaz Ahmed (10.71) – had the worst economy rates of any spinner to have bowled that many overs.Shahbaz Ahmed, brought in as an impact Player mainly for his batting, had a telling effect with the ball•Getty ImagesBoth started Friday night on the subs bench. It’s likely Markande, a legspinner who came into this game with eight wickets at an average of 32.37, was SRH’s first choice for Impact Player if things went well, or even reasonably well, with the bat. Shahbaz had only taken three wickets with his left-arm orthodox in 13 innings, at an average of 75.00.Shahbaz had done a commendable job as a utility allrounder, but in ideal circumstances SRH wouldn’t have wanted to lean on his batting. They had a top seven full of fearsome ball-strikers, and in Cummins a more-than-useful end-overs hitter at No. 8.If all went to plan for SRH, Shahbaz may have played no part in Qualifier 2 of IPL 2024.

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Things don’t always go to plan in T20. Randomness is an ever-present and frequently underplayed fact of the format. Seldom, though, does an entire match go off-script in the way Qualifier 2 did.SRH picked a starting XI without a proper spinner. They ended up bowling nine overs of spin, the most they’ve bowled in any match this season. They ended up taking 5 for 57 in those nine overs.Shahbaz, brought in as Impact Player more for his batting than his bowling after Sunrisers lost six wickets in their first 14 overs, completed his full four-over quota for the first time this season. Abhishek Sharma, who has the variety and bowling smarts to be a batting allrounder in a team prepared to use his bowling, bowled four overs too, having only bowled three previous overs all season. Aiden Markram, whose offspin hadn’t been used at all in IPL 2024 before Friday, chipped in with an over too.All this after RR’s celebrated spin duo of R Ashwin and Yuzvendra Chahal took a combined 0 for 77 from their eight overs.Who had any of this on their Qualifier 2 bingo card?There can be days when the best bowlers go off the boil and part-timers bowl like geniuses. This wasn’t one of those days.Having bowled just three overs all tournament previously, Abhishek Sharma bowled his full quota and returned two wickets•Associated PressThis, instead, was a day when conditions changed dramatically between innings. It routinely happens in Test cricket, and there are days when pitches wear significantly over the course of an ODI, such as the 1996 World Cup semi-final at Eden Gardens. It’s rare that a pitch can mutate over 40 overs like this one at the MA Chidambaram Stadium – a fresh surface used for the first time this season – did. The dew that both teams expected didn’t quite materialise, but it’s unlikely either team thought the ball would turn quite so much in the second innings if there was no dew.Thanks to ball-tracking technology, it’s possible to say just how much the conditions changed.At the start of the 16th over of RR’s chase, the broadcaster put up a graphic showing the average turn achieved during the two innings. RR’s spinners had generated 1.8 degrees of turn, and SRH’s a hair-raising 3.3 degrees.Ashwin, batting at No. 6, played what may have been RR’s defining innings of the night. He faced three balls, all against Shahbaz. He attempted front-foot drives against two of them, both pitching on a genuinely full length, and was beaten both times on the outside edge by significant margins. Then he tried to cut one and edged to the wicketkeeper.Sanju Samson and Kumar Sangakkara, RR’s captain and coach, refused to blame the conditions for their defeat, and felt 176 was a gettable target if their batters had made better choices. This may well have been the case, and it would certainly have helped them to have Yashasvi Jaiswal at the crease for longer. He fell for 42 off 21 in the first over of spin delivered by SRH, miscuing Shahbaz while looking for his second six of the over.

Things don’t always go to plan in T20. Randomness is an ever-present and frequently underplayed fact of the format. Seldom, though, does an entire match go off-script in the way Qualifier 2 did.

That wicket left Shahbaz and Abhishek bowling to a succession of right-right pairs, and the two left-arm spinners bowled 25 straight boundary-free balls following Jaiswal’s departure, that pressure contributing to RR losing three more wickets. RR’s chances all but evaporated in that time.Having looked unhittable all this while, Shahbaz and Abhishek served up reminders late in their spells – cruel reminders from RR’s perspective – that they were still, respectively, a batting allrounder and a part-timer, feeding Dhruv Jurel half-volleys that he drove for three fours in two overs.This strangest of T20 games, though, was already over as a contest.

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Were SRH the “better” side on the night? Probably. They recovered from a crisis to post a competitive total on one pitch, and they shut RR out when they bowled on another. They were forced into a tactical choice that brought them unexpected dividends, but they were also quick to jump to their non-regular options when they realised how the pitch was behaving. The fact that they subbed out Travis Head rather than Abhishek suggested they may have foreseen a scenario where they needed a second left-arm spinner against a predominantly right-handed line-up.SRH made the most of a favourable situation, and now find themselves in the IPL final. They deserve to be there for the season they’ve had, for playing a brand of T20 that’s hastened the evolution of the format and the language used to describe it, and for rewriting records and re-rewriting them. This wasn’t quite the way anyone thought they’d reach the final, and they’re unlikely to ever replicate performance with set of players, but what’s sport without a dash of the absurd?

She speaks with the team ahead of the Women’s T20 World Cup in the UAE

ESPNcricinfo staff25-Sep-2024On this week’s ESPNcricinfo podcast Powerplay, South Africa batter Tazmin Brits talks to Valkerie Baynes and Firdose Moonda about the car accident that changed her career, how cricket saved her and the challenges she faces now.