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Follow UsThe world was shocked when Ravi Shastri called Kuldeep Yadav India’s number 1 overseas spinner after the Sydney Test 2019.
The world was like, “I told you so,” when he was shown the door in almost all the teams he played for a few years later.
After all, left-arm leg spinners aren’t just supposed to be successful in the long run. They are like weapons whose novelty is their main ammunition.
But Kuldeep’s novelty fizzled out soon. His deliveries weren’t zipping through the air like they used to when he arrived on the international scene. His turning cobras had lost their venom. He was a few years old in the circuit, and the key batters of most prominent teams had figured out a way to play him on the back foot as they had ample time to make late adjustments now.
Kuldeep’s fall was as dramatic as his rise. He went so low during the 2018 Indian Premier League that the only way from there was up! Since then, he has been on a roller coaster that only goes up.
When he returned, not only was there more vigour in his action, but his speeds improved, his shoulder strength improved, and everything combined to put more revolutions in the ball. The result was a success. A lot of success.
In case you were wondering why the above tale was narrated, well, every superhero has to have an origin story, right? Because today, March 7, against the English at Dharamshala, Kuldeep the SuperSpinner unveiled himself to the world. He had shown signs of strength in the series before, but the showpiece event happened today.
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Nick Knight proclaimed the pitch as a belter with so much confidence that it felt like he was telling the world that the sun rises in the east. Knight would have been happy when Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj bowled to the English openers because it was coming on straight. No movement off the pitch. No vicious movement in the air.
The first batting decision was working wonders. Ashwin came out to bowl in his 100th Test and was dealt easily. It felt like a big first-innings total was imminent in the shadow of the Himalayas.
Then Kuldeep kuldeepeed England.
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Last ball of Kuldeep’s first over. Lunch is on the horizon, approaching fast.
The spinner from Kanpur tossed the ball fuller, around the off stump, and got the ball to drift (move in the air) just a bit from over the wicket to the left-handed Ben Duckett. Duckett saw an opportunity to clobber the ball down the ground for a six.
All Duckett could manage was a big edge, and the ball went high, landing safely into Shubman Gill’s bread basket, who took a fabulous catch.
Strike one.
If Duckett was beaten, Ollie Pope was completely flummoxed.
Before the delivery, Dhruv Jurel had already announced that Pope would dance down the track. And Pope danced like someone had played Naatu Naatu.
That’s what Kuldeep wanted. He bowled a googly, drifted it away from Pope from over the wicket, pitched it just short of a good length, and Pope’s bat was as far away from the ball as RRR was from a Best Actor Oscar. Jurel completed the stumping he predicted before itself.
The next dismissal was Zak Crawley, who was opened up like a fat man’s heart on the surgery table. The reason was drift. He bowled from over the wicket again, got the ball to drift in the air, landed it outside the off stump, and in an attempt to meet the delivery, Crawley extended his front foot and bat, opening up a big space for the ball to creep in like a surgeon’s scalpel.
It tore through the gap and obliterated his stumps, adding another batter to his list of magical dismissals.
Remember how Kuldeep’s novelty had vanished? Remember how batters could play everything from him on the backfoot? Well, try it now!
The reason for Jonny Bairstow’s fall was the same - the venomous drift that took the ball away from him and kissed his bat goodbye to the keeper’s gloves.
When he got Ben Stokes plumb next, he might have got a déjà vu. The last time he bowled at Dharamshala, he also got a fifer. However, that version of Kuldeep wasn’t injected with the super serum that made him a SuperSpinner.
And you know the best part? That super serum wasn’t supplied to him. He made it himself through sheer effort and willpower.
The fall had turned into a rise.
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Today, Kuldeep Yadav took a fifer. R. Ashwin, who was playing his 100th Test, took four lower-order wickets. Both spinners combined to end England’s dream in dreamy Dharamshala.
And you know what? As Ashwin reached the coveted milestone, his successor was ready. He was drifting it. He was turning it. He was fooling batters on a track that had no demons. He was turning India into a serendipitous spin future.
Shashtri was right, after all.
