leg-spin counters the big hitters...
Chetan Narula explores the dependance on leg-spinners in the IPL, and why they have become so valuable
Look up the team sheets of all eight IPL franchises, and a common streak appears prominently. Sift through the balance of Indian and overseas players, big-hitters and fast bowlers, and the balance of spin attack seems tilted towards a particular sort.
Leg-spinners have always been the weapon-of-choice in T20 cricket, and they seem to have gained in currency this season. “Slow wickets and leg-spinners, that’s what you get in abundance here in the Indian Premier League. Every side is packed with them. It is altogether a different challenge,” said England international Sam Billings, who is playing for Delhi Daredevils. He has a point, of course.
Sample this – every franchise boasts of at least two prominent leg-spinners, whether local picks or foreign ones, along with a couple of junior leg-break bowlers to boot. The pendulum swings from Mumbai Indians, who have a galaxy of superstars in their squad that they only need fringe spinners, to Rising Pune Supergiant, who have deployed two ‘overseas’ picks – Imran Tahir and Adam Zampa – in their first two games.
Then, there are Piyush Chawla and Kuldeep Yadav, a combination of conventional and unorthodox left-arm leg-spin taking the field for Kolkata Knight Riders. Elsewhere, Amit Mishra (Delhi Daredevils) and Yuzvendra Chahal (Royal Challengers Bangalore) are embroiled in a battle to find out who will be India’s third-choice spinner in the limited-overs’ arena.
“Leg spinners are prime wickettakers in the T20 format. They are very difficult to get away with, simply put, and this helps us assume an attacking role in the team’s plans,” said Mishra, who is the second-highest wicket-taker in IPL history with 126 wickets in 112 matches (behind Lasith Malinga’s 147 wickets as of Tuesday, April 18), including a record three hat-tricks. For the last couple of years, he had partnered with Tahir at Delhi Daredevils, sharing 24 wickets in 2015, and another 18 wickets in 2016.
Strangely enough, the Daredevils’ management decided to release Tahir, perhaps because they were suffering due to poor team balance pertaining to their numerous overseas picks. It was even stranger that Tahir was not picked up in the February 20 player auctions, belying his world No.1 ranking in ODIs/T20Is attained through impressive performances in the tour to New Zealand that same month. Rising Pune Supergiant called him up for duty, when R Ashwin pulled out of the season due to injury. Straightaway, skipper Steve Smith deployed him in tandem with Zampa, and the duo wreaked havoc in their first game against Mumbai Indians, sharing 4-54 in seven overs.
“I was obviously sad not to be picked in the auction, but there’s nothing I can do about it. But I like challenges. I am really relieved, and pleased with myself about the way I bowled today, and have been bowling recently,” said Tahir, after picking up three wickets in the space of 10 balls against Mumbai at Pune.
It reflects on the unpredictable nature of this format, and indeed the fickleness of the beast that is the IPL. An experienced pairing of Mishra and Tahir couldn’t do enough magic for Delhi last year, yet Tahir and Zampa are already gelling well. Even in the second game against the Daredevils, they were able to apply the brakes on scoring as well as get breakthroughs simultaneously.
Leg-spinners are prime wicket-takers in T20 cricket and assume an attacking role within a team’s plans
“I see myself as a wicket-taking bowler. But the IPL experience is about bowling in balance, and it is a great opportunity to learn and try new things. So, sometimes it helps when you are bowling with a similar bowler, and at other times, it doesn’t,” said Tahir, of the partnership with Mishra during his Delhi stint. “It depends on how the team management wants to use the two bowlers, and what strategy they come up with. It works or doesn’t work accordingly, and I think the captain plays a major role in this scenario where he has two similar bowlers operating in tandem,” opined Mishra further.
It begs the question if MS Dhoni, dropped as skipper by Pune in favour of Smith this season, would have deployed two leg-spinners in the same XI. The former Indian skipper used to baulk at such a combination even on the international stage. And it is not Dhoni alone, even Gautam Gambhir (Kolkata Knight Riders) has so far used Yadav and Chawla together in only one of their five matches (against Gujarat Lions) so far. In this latter scenario though, it is more down to an abundance of spin options in Sunil Narine, Shakib al Hasan and occasionally even Yusuf Pathan.
Expand this to a larger scale then, it comes down to the eventual balance IPL captains want to achieve in their bowling line-ups. As soon as Zampa was taken for a few runs, his partnership with Tahir was broken. Elsewhere, as aforementioned, Mumbai boast a galaxy of stars and they do not want to disturb their set combination for this additional ‘leg spin’ factor.
Others, like Daredevils, play around one talismanic spinner, and attempt to balance their attack accordingly. Against Kolkata Knight Riders at Delhi on April 17, the hosts dropped left-arm spinner Shahbaz Nadeem to accommodate an extra pacer, whilst retaining Mishra in the playing XI. It was an eye-raising selection – Nadeem has a staggering economy of 4.9 in 10 overs across Delhi’s first three games in this tournament. Skipper Zaheer Khan and coach/mentor Rahul Dravid though bought into Mishra’s experience, and his record as the most successful spinner in IPL history. He ended up being expensive (1-26 in 2.5 overs), and conceded defeat in the last over he bowled as Kolkata chased 169.
Of course, it points to the lack of imbalance in this slam-bang format, wherein even the assured returns of a leg-spinner cannot guarantee victory against batsmen intent on hitting everything out of the park. For, on the other side of the spectrum, you have Samuel Badree, a leg-spinner from the Caribbean who took this IPL season’s first hat-trick (four wickets for nine runs) against Mumbai Indians. Even so, he was already beaten to what is the most impressive spell of spin in two weeks yet.
At the Wankhede, a ground famous for dew early in the evening, Rashid Khan, bowling with a wet ball, took 1-19 in four overs as he stifled Mumbai’s run-chase on their home ground. Being the first Afghanistan cricketer to feature in the IPL, Khan has enjoyed a fair share of spotlight in the past fortnight.
Most of it though is to do with how he has bamboozled batsmen so far, domestic and foreign both, ending up in contention for the Purple Cap (most wickets) with nine in five matches so far.
“I woke up and was watching the auction. Tahir’s name came and went. I was a little bit tense and was thinking if he was not taken then how would I be? It was wonderful to be part of an IPL team. You can’t express that feeling,” he told Reuters, after the game against Gujarat Lions on April 10.
It is the story of this season so far – a leg-spinner from an associate nation, strangling international batsmen, both domestic and foreign, on placid wickets in a franchise T20 league in the most cricket-crazy nation in the world. Three months down the line, he will be playing for Afghanistan at the Home of Cricket against MCC (July 11). It will be quite a fancy journey for the leg-spinner, if it hasn’t already been one.