All posts by h716a5.icu

Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni, R Ashwin and others on India’s win, as they lifted an ICC trophy after 11 years

ESPNcricinfo staff30-Jun-2024

Every star added to the Team India jersey inspires our nation’s starry-eyed children to move one step closer to their dreams. India gets the 4th star, our second in @T20WorldCup.

Life comes full circle for Indian cricket in the West Indies. From our lows in the 2007 ODI World… pic.twitter.com/HMievynpsE

— Sachin Tendulkar (@sachin_rt) June 29, 2024

Hit-the-deck seamer impresses in Multan after long wait for Test debut

Matt Roller12-Oct-2024Mark Wood’s pace was instrumental to England’s win in Multan two years ago but they hardly missed him this week, such was Brydon Carse’s impact. Carse replicated Wood’s role on Test debut, bowling at high pace with the old ball to finish with match figures of 4 for 140 – which would have been even better but for two dropped catches off his bowling.Wood, who is stuck at home recovering from an elbow injury, sent Carse a WhatsApp message to wish him luck the night before the Test, and another after the second day to reassure him that conditions do not get much tougher for fast bowlers. Carse admitted it had been “a long slog” at times, but the early evidence is that he has the raw materials to make him a success.He has already impressed in white-ball cricket, taking eight wickets in last month’s ODIs against Australia in vastly different conditions. “Playing one-day cricket in England in seven or eight degrees is very different to coming out here, and it’s had its different challenges,” Carse said. “But I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the challenge and the role that I’ve played this week.”Related

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Carse took four wickets at 106 in his four Championship matches for Durham this season, but England’s management viewed those performances as utterly irrelevant. They pick on attributes, not averages, and believed that Carse’s bustling pace and endurance would enable him to withstand the rigours of playing Test cricket overseas.And Carse’s record alone did not tell the story of his summer: three of those four matches came shortly after he found out that he was the subject of an investigation by the Cricket Regulator into a series of bets he had placed as a young professional. It led to a three-month ban, ending his hopes of making his Test debut in the English summer.The prospect of days like Friday – completing and then celebrating his first Test win – helped him through some dark moments. “I had some time off to work on a few things that I wanted to and improve my fitness in certain areas,” he said. “I’ve come back refreshed and just wanting to do well and play as much as I can for England.”Carse was picked for the first Test ahead of Matt Potts, his Durham team-mate, because England want at least one genuine fast bowler in their attack every time they take the field. He regularly hit 90mph/145kph on the first day of the Test, and sustained his pace through the match enough to strike Aamer Jamal on the helmet with a short ball on the final morning.Brydon Carse had to put in the hard yards on Test debut•Getty ImagesHe batted at No. 9, and hit his second ball for six to take England past 800. “I was winding the lads up saying, ‘I don’t think many of you have got off the mark with a six,'” Carse joked. Down the line, he could be a viable No. 8 – as evidenced by a pair of first-class hundreds, most recently against Somerset in August.Carse has been on England’s radar for some time: born and raised in South Africa, he toured with the Lions in 2019-20, shortly after qualifying. He made his ODI debut in 2021, when England’s first-choice squad were decimated by Covid protocols, and impressed some senior players that winter when part of the Lions squad which shadowed England’s Ashes tour.”He got injured quite early on… But you got the impression he could have been added to the squad and actually done a job,” James Anderson recalled on the podcast. “I just really like him: he bowls quick, he can move the ball, and he’s got that sort of action where he almost pauses in his delivery stride and then really snaps at the crease, so it makes it feel even quicker for the batters.”On the fourth evening in Multan, Carse demonstrated that he has skills as well as stamina. He had been gifted a wicket with his first ball of Pakistan’s second innings – Saim Ayub wildly slogging to mid-off – and was bowling in tandem with Chris Woakes, who had started to get the ball reversing. Woakes passed on the message, and Carse pounced.”I joked with him and said, ‘Here we go, right, I’m going to target the stumps,'” Carse said. “And the next ball, it reversed back in.” The ball tailed back late, flicking the top of Mohammad Rizwan’s back pad before cannoning into the top of middle stump. “I felt like I was bowling quite nicely to him in the previous over, so to get him out was a nice feeling.”Along with Potts, Gus Atkinson and Josh Tongue, Carse was one of the fast bowlers that England invested heavily in last winter, awarding them two-year central contracts as they look to build a stock of fast bowlers ahead of next year’s Ashes tour. They share a similar profile: they are all seamers rather than swing bowlers, whose stock balls nip back in.Carse, at 29, is the oldest of those four. After his ban this summer, which reinforced the temporary nature of an athlete’s career, he exudes the sense of a player determined to grasp his opportunity. “It’s been a special five days,” he said. “It’s been hard graft, and it was difficult at times today [Friday] but it’s very rewarding to come away with a win.”

Pakistan had plenty of chances to record a much higher second-innings score than they did, but “same mistakes” let them down

Danyal Rasool29-Dec-2024Pakistan may have a reputation for unpredictability, but followers of the Test side in South Africa know exactly what’s going to happen. It is the tale of the person who bangs their head against a brick wall every day, only because they fantasise about how good it’ll feel the day they stop.There were some tantalising moments when Pakistan wondered if day three of the first Test in Centurion would be that day. But then again, if you’ve been banging your head that long, perhaps it feels that way every day. And yet few innings clip onto them the sense of destiny that Babar Azam’s did overnight. A contribution of note, especially if it helped Pakistan win their first Test in South Africa since 2007, would be a contender as his magnum opus. It may herald his comeback, help his career pick up a second wind. It was a lot to saddle on an innings that had largely been compiled by scratching and scraping his way to an unbeaten 16 in the late summer twilight of the second day.The extended wait thanks to the morning rain added yet more gravitas to the innings, and once play began, you could see whatever you wished to see. Babar’s punch behind square leg off Kagiso Rabada was followed by a slap past point, so did that mean he was back to his best? You’d have to ignore the flatness of the pitch or the fact that on the few occasions Rabada found his line outside off stump, Babar’s struggle with the bounce was hard to miss.Related

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The festive crowd in South Africa can be quite partisan, but even those who braved the uncooperative weather in the morning – and there were a few thousand of them – understood the precipice it briefly felt like Babar’s career hinged on. Every boundary met murmurs of approval from the wider crowd, amplified by a vociferous pocket in the Grandstand who held up placards of support, and chanted his name. Like them, he appeared to be raging against the dying of a career that should have been in its prime at this stage.When he whipped sudden local favourite Corbin Bosch to midwicket for four and got himself off strike with a single, it was his highest score in nearly two years. A nudge into the deep got him past a milestone that once had been a glib stepping stone, a half-century that brought the dressing room to its feet.But hope can bring its own kind of torture, especially when it comes with the gnawing sense of approaching doom. This was not an innings of a turning tide as much as it was opportunistic accumulation. The infuriating, inveterate dab to the slips had not been cut out of his game, the tendency to get caught squared up against seam movement always rendered him vulnerable. This was not a new Babar, just the same man with the same ability, and ultimately, the same fallibility.Babar Azam scored his first fifty in nearly two years in Test cricket•Associated PressAnd it didn’t take much. South Africa had positioned a fielder at deep third all afternoon, so square it barely counted as a catching position. Marco Jansen tossed one out wide to Babar; he would later say one of the plans involved inducing Pakistani batters into playing shots they attempted because of impatience rather than intent. But, really, it was short, wide, boundary fodder.In the past, Babar’s eyes would narrow as he ruthlessly dispatched it along the ground, piercing whatever gap needed to be pierced to find the boundary. Now, his widened eyes appeared childlike, as if the sweets cupboard had been left unlocked, and he snatched greedily without seemingly appreciating the trap it was.He was late; Jansen is quick. His bat face tilted upwards; Jansen is tall. And Bosch at the boundary had a gift, because Pakistan in this Test have exhausted a year’s supply of generosity on the debutant. Babar’s expression suggested disbelief, though the mind can superimpose emotions onto human faces; he might just as easily have been blank.

“When we play outside Pakistan, we’re not able to finish well, whether it’s innings or matches. That is a slight concern. We made some of the same mistakes today”Saud Shakeel

Saud Shakeel, who Jansen would ensnare with an equally inoffensive delivery, spoke openly of Pakistan’s frustrations. “We’re making some of these mistakes; it also happened when we went to Australia. When we play outside Pakistan, we’re not able to finish well, whether it’s innings or matches. That is a slight concern. We made some of the same mistakes today. This 148-run target could easily have been a 200-plus target.”Listening to what might have been, though, is perhaps more painful for Pakistan supporters than the head-banging. Pakistan could have set a higher target in 2007 or 2013 in Cape Town, or 2018 in Centurion. They could have made South Africa work for their wickets a little more on the third day, or been more effective at polishing off South Africa’s last two wickets on the second. They could yet produce a remarkable bowling effort and still salvage it all, with 121 runs still to play with.Or perhaps, because they never do, maybe it never was possible. As Babar’s expression suggested, if you really wanted to read into it, some hopes are always accompanied by doom. Perhaps all there is to Pakistan in South Africa is the head, and that brick wall.

With the Champions Trophy almost here, it is only natural for thoughts in the country to turn to the World Cup hosted there 29 years ago

Danyal Rasool16-Feb-2025″The worst experience,” Aaqib Javed says without hesitation “was Bangalore.”We’re standing behind the practice nets at the National Cricket Academy in the Gaddafi Stadium. A young hopeful from regional Punjab is trying to impress Aaqib, Pakistan’s interim head coach. It’s a lovely winter’s day, the sun washing over the ground without yet carrying the oppressive potency it will gain in a few weeks. There’s machinery and construction equipment all around. Pakistan’s most famous cricket stadium, with its iconic Mughal façade, is being torn down and rebuilt to service the demands of the 21st century and of the upcoming Champions Trophy.It’s a fitting time to reminisce, and Aaqib is thinking about 1996 quarter-final. “If you look at the stadium,” he says, about the Chinnaswamy, “the stands are right on top of you. If there was any flashpoint, or if anything notable happened, the din was unimaginable. It was so loud that our ears continued ringing the next day.”Related

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Bangalore’s crowd on the day will take that as a compliment, and in truth, they had much to shout about that night. India beat Pakistan in a feisty encounter, ending Pakistan’s defence of their World Cup title and their dreams of lifting cricket’s biggest trophy on their own patch, at the Gaddafi Stadium, where the final was held.The 1996 World Cup was perhaps the last major cricket tournament of a sepia-tinted era, before modernity arrived on cricket’s doorstep at the turn of the century. Aaqib, and Pakistan, look upon it with a special kind of fondness for a very particular reason: it remains – at least until the Champions Trophy kicks off on 19 February – the last ICC event Pakistan has hosted.”I have good memories of that WC,” Aaqib says. “We played a few matches in Lahore. It was completely normal in terms of security, both in India and Pakistan. When we went to India, it was all very relaxed there too.Aaqib has good reason for his happy memories. Pakistan were among the strongest starters in the tournament, and played all their group matches at home. They won all four games he played in, losing just the one to South Africa where he was absent, and finished second in their group.Aaqib Javed, Pakistan’s white-ball coach, doesn’t have fond memories of the 1996 quarter-final In Bangalore, where Pakistan were knocked out of their home World Cup•AFP via Getty ImagesMuch of the feel-good factor had little to do with the cricket itself but where it was played. The subcontinent was a nascent cricketing power hub at the time. Pakistan and India co-hosted the 1987 World Cup; this time around, Sri Lanka joined them. Pakistan’s fans had begun to enjoy the taste of high-profile cricket they were getting, Lahore, Karachi and Gujranwala were packed to the brim; according to Aaqib, there wasn’t any standing room left. Pakistan believed the floodgates would open in the years that followed. A parching drought, instead, has seen them go more than a generation without a similar event, to the extent that most Pakistanis have no memories of what hosting such a tournament is like.Ehsan Mani, a recent PCB chairman and former president of the ICC, does. He was directly involved in the management of the 1996 World Cup. As a member of the Pak-Indo-Lanka Joint Management Committee (PILCOM), the advisory committee for the tournament, he has fond memories of what he remembers as a constructive relationship with his counterparts in India and Sri Lanka.”In 1987, India took the lead,” he says. “In 1996, Pakistan took the lead. We played a big part in actually getting the hosting rights. The difference at the time was, India wanted to work with us, and there was a lot of mutual respect between us. The world was different. India-Pakistan matches were the largest in the world then too, but India didn’t have as much money in those days. In fact, Pakistan was more or less equal in reserves and profits to India. The dynamics were very different.”Mani views his partnership with the late Jagmohan Dalmiya as instrumental to the success of that 1987 tournament, recalling they used to speak “four or five times a day”. Dalmiya worked on the commercial side and Mani handled the media aspect. The tournament ran into headwinds early, with an issue Pakistan have over the years become accustomed to needing to handle: security concerns.Back then, though, those concerns affected Sri Lanka, which was in the midst of a civil war, with Australia and West Indies refusing to send their teams to the country. Mani recalls how Pakistan and India stood up for South Asia’s new emerging cricketing nation.In February that year, Pakistan and India put together a joint team – six Pakistanis and five Indians, captained by Mohammad Azharuddin, who played an ODI against a Sri Lankan XI in Colombo, to show how safe the country was for cricket.Work on the Gaddafi Stadium’s renovations races against time early in February 2025•Asif Hassan/AFP/Getty Images”It was about personal relationships with our counterparts” Mani says. “We got on well with each other. There were certain government policies that made things complicated, but when you get on well at board level, it eases things.”In the end, Australia and West Indies didn’t go to Sri Lanka anyway, but the tournament ticked along nicely. Sri Lanka won their other three matches and eased into the quarter-final, as did Pakistan and India, who met each other in that Bangalore cauldron. Pakistan captain Wasim Akram famously pulled out of that match.”Pakistan were looking very strong at the time,” Aaqib says. “In that India game, Wasim Akram dropping out at the last minute was a huge blow. We found out at the toss he wasn’t playing. When your captain, and a bowler like Wasim Akram, is suddenly unavailable, it has a huge effect on morale because we had no strategic or mental way of preparing for it. I don’t understand what happened there but it definitely hurt us.”There was a further flashpoint when Aamer Sohail sledged Venkatesh Prasad during a strong Pakistan response to a stiff target, only to be cleaned up next delivery and for Pakistan’s chase to eventually fall apart. In Akram’s absence, Aaqib says ” we just conceded too many runs. 280-odd was too much. We could have coped around 250-260 – at the time that was what was considered chase-able.”While any animosity between the two sides remained on the field, Mani believes all of that had changed markedly by the time he became chairman in 2018. “Our relationship aged poorly. When Sourav Ganguly became BCCI president, we felt he was effectively a frontman for Jay Shah [who served as the Asian Cricket Council president at the time]. Things were not very good.”The PCB was awarded the 2025 Champions Trophy weeks after Mani left the PCB. Pakistan had also put in a joint bid for a T20 World Cup with the UAE, as well as for the 2031 ODI World Cup with Bangladesh, but neither ultimately ended up successful. It is something Mani says he’s disappointed the PCB did not actively follow up on after he left.Ehsan Mani (second from left) remembers a more cordial age of India-Pakistan cricket relations: “It was about personal relationships with our counterparts”•Getty ImagesAs a result, the PCB, as well as Pakistan at large, have thrown their entire investment – financial and emotional – into the Champions Trophy. Though stadium upgradations were left until the 11th hour, no expense was spared in razing Gaddafi Stadium to the ground and building it anew, while renovations of varying degrees have taken place in Karachi and Rawalpindi. At the same time, the PCB pushed India harder than they ever have in the past in an attempt to ensure the entire tournament took place in Pakistan.It didn’t ultimately happen, and the UAE had to be roped in as a venue for all of India’s games. As such, Pakistan find themselves in a farcical situation: Lahore hosted the 1996 World Cup final, a tournament Pakistan co-hosted with India and Sri Lanka, but may not host the final of this event, officially awarded solely to Pakistan.”As soon as the ICC awarded events to India and Pakistan, the ICC should have got involved,” Mani says. “It [the negotiation about India] should have nothing to do with the PCB. It was an ICC event. Greg Barclay [then ICC chairman] should have dealt with it.”If you remember, Pakistan and India were not playing cricket before 2004 for many years. Pakistan had Mr Shaharyar Khan as the chairman, who was highly respected by the BCCI and everyone else. I went to India as ICC chairman and said we should not mix cricket with politics. And when I went to meet the ministers in India, the BCCI board members used to come with me to these government meetings and support what I was saying. It was a different world.”Though 1996 remains Pakistan’s most recent reference point, Aaqib in his position as the current side’s coach cautions against assigning too much weight to it. “The biggest mistake you can make in such an event is when you start treating it as a special event. You end up making the wrong team and break your continuity. Look at the T20 World Cup last year – we brought back players who haven’t played in ages. Mohammad Amir came in, Imad [Wasim] came in, Shadab [Khan] batted at four, Imad at five, it became a bit of a mess.”When we were kings: 1992 marks a high point in Pakistan cricket that remains a magnet for nostalgia•PA Images via Getty ImagesIn a quirk of fate, Pakistan are official hosts of an event they go into as defending champions, just as they were last time around, in 1996. And though Pakistan have long viewed that ’90s side as something of a quixotic ideal, Aaqib thinks at least part of the reason why it is regarded that way is nostalgia.”That side had bigger names,” he concedes. “Those huge names are absent from our current side. But when Wasim didn’t play that quarter-final, there was a huge drop-off in terms of quality. Now you won’t feel one absence forces you to drop so far down skill-wise. Javed Miandad and Saleem Malik were fading away, and that was an ageing team that hadn’t been refreshed after 1992.”It is also the time, perhaps, from which disillusioned Pakistan cricket followers hail in their greatest concentration. Pakistan is a young country; the average age is less than 21. Stories of Pakistan’s cricket team from the ’90s – one of cricket’s most charismatic and enigmatic sides – are often filtered through the lenses of former fans, who rode the high of ’92, enjoyed the optimism of the rest of the decade, and signed off when it became clear Pakistan were not so much on the cusp of a golden age as on the crest of a wave that was soon to crash. Current fans have heard, but cannot verify, that that was when following Pakistan cricket was truly worth it.The 1996 World Cup, when cricket came home, is perhaps something of a psychological shortcut to that time, one not available to those who came after. “I think cricket fever is just as high now, if not higher,” Aaqib says. “Especially with social media and the hype that it can create. And the average fan’s cricket sense has increased. When cricket’s on, everything else shuts down, TV dramas, other programmes and all the rest.”And unlike those who saw that tournament through a heady, optimistic lens of what the future held, Pakistan now know how rare these moments are. There isn’t another men’s ICC event slated in the calendar for them to host, and each one invariably comes with the added complication of India’s refusal to travel.So if Aaqib believes Pakistan shouldn’t treat it as a special tournament, he will have his work cut out convincing everyone else.

India kept the series alive with a heroic draw at Old Trafford. Alan Gardner hears from Sid Monga and Vish Ehantharajah about a fractious finish and what to expect at The Oval

ESPNcricinfo staff29-Jul-2025India fought their way to a valiant draw at Old Trafford, although most of the headlines revolved around England’s frustration at not being able to call the Test off early as Ravindra Jadeja and Washington Sundar batted on to centuries. On this week’s Switch, Alan Gardner was joined by Sid Monga and Vish Ehantharajah to look back on the fourth Test. Among the topics discussed were England’s petty reaction, the character shown by India, significant milestones for Joe Root and Ben Stokes, and how the two teams are shaping up ahead of the final Test of a gruelling series.

Ex-pat community rally round to celebrate the occasion of first Test in England since 2003

Firdose Moonda24-May-2025It is as rare for a team that loses by an innings and 45 runs to go on a celebratory lap around the ground as it is for Zimbabwe to play in England, which may be why they did it. The post-match presentation had not even happened when Zimbabwe’s squad went to meet their fans, who had spent the past three days singing the country’s traditional supporter’s songs, waving its flag and soaking in the feeling of home.Theirs is a population that is dispersed around the world, often through necessity not choice, as a collapsing economy forced people to seek opportunity abroad. The largest diaspora resides in neighbouring South Africa. The second largest? In England, where more than 100,000 Zimbabweans live. If you didn’t know any better, you’d have thought all of them were at Trent Bridge, given the reception they gave the national cricket team, who played their first Test in England in 22 years in what has been received as a symbol of new-found relevance.”We had an idea that there was going to be a lot of support for us and there’s a lot more fans out there today than there was yesterday,” Craig Ervine, Zimbabwe’s captain said at the press conference afterwards. “We can hear them singing from up in the changing room where we were sitting, and it’s pretty special.”There was almost a note of apology in Ervine’s voice. “I know losing is difficult to take, but the lap that we did shows how special the fans are for us and how much we also appreciate their support day in and day out. These are fans that haven’t had the opportunity to come and see us play for a long time and a lot of guys would have just seen us play on TV, so to watch us play live will be special for them. We also wanted to give them something to remember when they go back home.”Those memories will not be all good. After choosing to bowl first under cloudy skies, Zimbabwe’s bowlers broke records they won’t want to be reminded of. They conceded the most runs on the first day of a Test in England, which was a combination of nerves and inexperience that Ervine has already analysed and hopes they can learn from.”We weren’t really up to par,” he said. “Our big quicks probably didn’t get enough in the right area. According to the data, it was only around 40% in the six meter length. When you do get it in the right area, especially in these conditions, you ask a lot of questions of the batters and unfortunately, we couldn’t do that which then made it difficult to be able to control the scoring.”Zimbabwe took 67 for 3 on the second morning, too late to make a material difference to the total they had allowed England to get, but enough to show some fight. It was with the bat that the resilience their nation is known for started to emerge.Sean Williams salutes the crowd after his innings was ended by Shoaib Bashir•Getty ImagesBrian Bennett’s 139 – also Zimbabwe’s fastest Test hundred – was the stand-out but there were other contributions. Even though Zimbabwe followed on, there was resistance from Sean Williams, Sikandar Raza and Wessly Madhevere and Ervine was proud of their effort. “From a batting perspective, guys really, really fought hard. We got ourselves into decent positions in both innings and couldn’t really kick on,” he said.That two of the three Zimbabwe batters to go past fifty are 38 and 39 years old respectively does not worry Ervine or make him question the strength of their younger talent. Instead, it suggests there’s the opportunity for knowledge transfer between those who have been around (and Williams has been in the set-up for two decades) and those who are coming through.”It’s important to have that blend, especially in Test cricket, with the senior players and junior players,” he said. “You don’t want to put too much responsibility on the younger guys. But if you look at the maturity that Brian Bennett has bought, he’s only 21 and he’s got a bright future ahead of him.”So do Zimbabwe, at least in fixtures terms. They play six more Tests this year (two against each of South Africa, New Zealand and Afghanistan), all at home, where Ervine hopes they can show what they’ve learnt in tougher conditions in England.”You face the ball moving around up front, being asked questions of your technique, your defence, and then, if you get through that period, you also have to get through a short ball period so there’s lots of little challenges in there,” he said. “If you can combat those in these conditions, there’s no reason why you can’t get through those same challenges back home in familiar conditions at home.”Related

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The first four home Tests will be played in Bulawayo, which is slower and lower than England but the pace attacks of both South Africa and New Zealand will pose a similar threat. At the same time, both those sides have strong batting line-ups and Ervine would like to see his seamers perform better.”From a bowling perspective, guys will understand that they weren’t at their best,” he said. “We’ve got to get better and in conditions back home, which are possibly a little bit flatter, we’ve got to be a lot more consistent and a lot more patient. There’s a lot of things that we can take out of these things that we need to improve on, and not just talk about.”And Zimbabwe don’t have to wait too long to start showing that they’ve learnt their lesson. In nine days’ time, they play South Africa at Arundel as part of the latter’s preparations for the World Test Championship final. The extra fixture in England means Zimbabwe will have spent a month in the country and have played three red-ball matches, which has presented many opportunities to gain experience and as many to see their compatriots And it’s that that seems to matter so much.Now that the bilateral door to England is open again, Ervine hopes Zimbabwe will be back and promised when that happens, they will also be better.”The Zimbabwean fans will really appreciate that, so they don’t have to wait so long to see us play in the UK again,” he said. “And as a Zimbabwean player, there’s no better place to come and test yourself as a cricketer. Now that we’ve had a taste of what it’s like, when we come back here, hopefully it’s soon enough, we’ll be better prepared.”

Having last played in India in 2015, he has returned with much more knowledge and skill, and it was on display on the second day of the Kolkata Test

Firdose Moonda15-Nov-20252:21

What did Simon Harmer do right?

Pretend you’re reading just this after both teams had batted once in the Eden Gardens Test. Pretend it’s the point at which South Africa have limited India’s lead to just 30 runs and the match is still evenly poised and bubbling with promise. Pretend that the most important talking point is how a South African attack did what South African attacks are known for and brought their side back into the game, this time without Kagiso Rabada, this time thanks to Simon Harmer.The offspinner made the most important incisions on the day when he removed Washington Sundar, Dhruv Jurel and Ravindra Jadeja, all of whom threatened to bat South Africa out of the game, and finished with 4 for 30. He extracted more turn than anyone else in the match so far – including the Indian spinners – with an average of 4.3 degrees, and quickly assessed the right lines, length and pace to bowl for maximum efficacy.Harmer’s game plan developed in the solitary over he bowled on the first evening when he started off bowling quite full to Washington, then pulled back the length a touch, drew Washington forward and nearly took the edge. The ball spun away sharply and didn’t find Washington’s bat but Harmer knew he could use that to his advantage on day two.Related

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“From that first over last night over against Washington, it was quite evident that the ball was going to turn and you want to be testing batters on the front foot,” Harmer said at the post-day press conference. “If you allow them time to go back, it allows them to adjust and play the turn off the wicket. So you try to test batters on the front foot and test their front foot defence, which allows the ball to spin past the bat and brings in both edges. Then you also try and get one not to turn to bring in lbw, but overall, it was pretty evident that you needed to be fuller rather than shorter on that wicket.”Fuller but not entirely full. Harmer bowled 47 of his 92 balls on that length and was especially effective against left-hand batters. He only conceded nine runs off the 38 length deliveries he bowled to left-handers. He was also accurate with his line – 39% of his deliveries were sent down in line with the stumps, leaving batters little room to do anything but defend.That’s ultimately how he got Washington, an hour into the second day’s play. Harmer first went very full and then more on a good length, Washington stepped forward to defend and the ball took the edge as it turned away. He similarly challenged Rishabh Pant. Jurel also went forward and popped a return catch to Harmer and with Jadeja, it was the arm ball that skidded on.”It’s also about having the subtle variations of balls that don’t turn,” he said. “Sometimes you get onto turning wickets, you’re just trying to turn it more and more and more and the skill lies in bowling a ball that doesn’t turn on a wicket that is turning. Obviously, I’ve got a lot more experience since the last time I was here.”Simon Harmer rattled India•Getty ImagesIf there is a secret to Harmer’s success, it’s that he has returned to India a decade after first playing in the country, armed with much more knowledge and skill, and his bowling demonstrates his full evolution.Harmer’s international career can be divided into three parts: his emergence in 2015, his needs-must recall in 2022 during the late Covid-19 pandemic period when several frontliners were at the IPL, and his proper comeback now.In 2015, Harmer was a spinner who had been highly successful on the South African domestic circuit, but because it was not a place known to produce great spinners, he did not come into the national set-up with the reputation of a match-winner. He played one Test at home before tours to the subcontinent and he felt the weight of expectation to perform. “I was quite new to Test cricket. Ravi Ashwin was bowling like a jet and it was the expectation that I needed to do the same, so I was dealing with that and putting myself under even more pressure,” Harmer said.South Africa lost that series 3-0 (and would have lost 4-0 if not for rain in Bengaluru) and Harmer was one of the casualties of the tour that went as badly as it could. Looking back, he can acknowledge his own shortcomings. “When I got dropped from the national side in 2015 was when I realised that I wasn’t good enough,” he said.So he worked on it. “I came back to India in 2016 to work with Umesh Patwal in Mumbai and I discovered a lot about spin bowling that I didn’t know. That was probably the point of my career that gave me the ammunition to get better and develop and become a decent spinner.”That was only the start. In 2017, Harmer signed a Kolpak deal, which began a nine-season-and-counting stint at Essex, where he took his game to the next level. In those nine years, he has not once been outside the country championship’s top ten wicket-takers (he was also the leading bowler in 2019, 2020, and 2022) and the consistency of his returns shows a commitment to continual upskilling. “In the UK, bowling on flat wickets or when there are footmarks and nothing outside of those footmarks, you need to find a way to get the ball to spin quickly,” he explained. “It’s a skill that I’ve developed there by being able to bowl it a little bit flatter, not always just relying on the loop. Sometimes on slow wickets, it’s too slow and batters can play off the back foot. So it’s about understanding my game more and finding ways to be better.”Harmer picked up the key wicket of Washington Sundar•BCCIWhen the Kolpak system ended after the UK’s exit from the European Union, Harmer was available for South Africa, but Keshav Mahraraj was established as their No. 1. Harmer has understood that he will likely only be called on when South Africa need additional spin resources. And then, he can bring the wealth of experience he has gained on the county circuit to the national side.”I’m a lot more confident in my ability. I don’t have as many doubts as I did back then and I was fighting for a place in the team,” he said. “Now I feel like I have the skill set to compete. Whether or not it goes my way is sometimes the luck of the draw, but as long as I can look back and say that I put a good amount of balls in the right area, then I can be happy with that.”If the day had ended there, Harmer could have left the ground entirely satisfied with his work and where he had put South Africa. From a first innings blowout, they were in a position where they could put themselves in the driving seat but to think they did that, we’d have to pretend.South Africa finished effectively 63 for 7, with Harmer next in to bat. He will have to do the same job he did with the ball, and drag South Africa into the contest to give them, and mostly himself, a chance to bowl India out cheaply. He knows it won’t be easy.”In an ideal situation, you’ve got 300 on the board, and you can set attacking fields but it becomes quite intricate when you’ve only got 150 on the board, and you need to take wickets but you also can’t leak runs,” he said. “It’s quite evident that the pitch is going to do enough. It’s just about not getting carried away and making sure that you’re putting as many balls in the right areas as you possibly can. We all know that we need to be at our best but we have the belief that we can still pull ourselves back into this game.”Or, at least, they can pretend to.