Shami leaves a reminder of his T20 potential

You hit me once, I will come back harder

This seems to be the motto Mohammed Shami lives by, as a cricketer at least. Every time he has been brushed aside for any inconvenience, on-field or off-field, he has stormed back to showcase his grit camouflaged with his quality as a cricketer. The biggest example will remain to be the new-found consistency in his international career right after some major bumps in his personal life. 

Shami was questioned as a white-ball bowler but stormed into the 2019 World Cup side. He picked 14 wickets in four games, including a hat-trick. His credentials as a T20 bowler were still under the scanner. He stormed into the 2021 T20 World Cup squad based on a couple of strong IPL seasons which underlined his ability to nail yorkers consistently. However, the T20 World Cup was nothing like the ODI variant that preceded two years ago. India flunked in the group stage. Shami went wicketless in the first two games (against Pakistan and New Zealand) that had sealed India’s fortunes in the tournament. 

Such campaigns always lead to a dead-end for a few players. Shami was perceived to be one of them. Aged 31, he had played only 17 T20Is. With a budding crop of Indian pacers, it seemed evident that he will be brushed aside for someone younger. Probably it was on the same path that he didn’t play any T20Is post the World Cup. Shami was in a position to prove himself again. This was his first T20 since the 2021 T20 World Cup. 

As he has done over the past couple of years, he grabbed the first opportunity. In fact, the first ball on this occasion. While KL Rahul had to change his mindset from Test cricket to the T20 format, Shami stayed with the basics of the red-ball format. 

Seam straighter than an arrow, length just full enough to bring the batsman forward and a hint of movement from the probing line outside the off stump. Over the past few months, Rahul has revitalized his Test career based on his judicious judgment around the off stump. But this first delivery from Shami was just too good. Rahul knew he couldn’t have done anything with it, irrespective of the format, irrespective of the fact that this was the first ball of his innings or the 120th. 

Sending his previous captain for a golden duck, Shami became the first bowler to take a wicket on a franchise’s debut. 

The Wankhede generally offers mild assistance to fast bowlers upfront. Shami, with his aforementioned attributes, turned the knob from mild to extreme. In his next over, he left Quinton de Kock motionless. Coming around the wicket, another move that has brought him vast success in Test cricket, Shami sneaked through the southpaw’s defence. de Kock had surrendered as if he is held at gunpoint. On air, Harsha Bhogle compared it to the ball obeying the bowler’s instructions. 

In his third over, Shami hit the top of Manish Pandey’s off stump. Sure, Pandey played that with his idiosyncratic technique but in a similar vein with Rahul and de Kock, he couldn’t have done anything about it. 

In a format that is about restricting the batsmen to the minimum every ball, watching a bowler at his full throttle is a rare sight. A brilliant long-format bowler creating a Test cricket-like environment where run-scoring is subverted into a secondary option for the batter is further rare. All of Shami’s three wickets came from the traditional Test match bowling - targeting the top of the off-stump. 

Starting with Rahul, he broke the back of Lucknow’s batting, making it stoop lower after every over of his new-ball spell. He finished with 3/10 after the powerplay, completing three overs from his quota of four. Lucknow recovered to post 158 runs on the board once Shami was rested. 

A tough last over stretched his figures to 3/25. As good as they are, they could have been better had Lockie Ferguson held on to the catch to dismiss the revelation Ayush Badoni in Shami’s last over. 

However, the 31-year old had done his job. On a surface where the par score appeared to be around 170, Shami’s spell deprived Lucknow of 15-20 runs. 

That is exactly why wickets upfront remain a necessity no matter what is format you are playing. That is why wicket-takers are of prime significance. And Shami, for the nth time, has showcased there is no better wicket-taker than him, whether it's the red ball or the white one. Ignore him at your peril. 

“When the ball comes out of your hand well, people say it's a God gift but not exactly, I have worked on it a lot”, said the right-arm seamer on receiving his player-of-the-match award.