Zaheer Khan

Is Sachin Tendulkar preventing India from having fast bowlers?

This week, Zaheer Khan said:

“Indian bodies are not designed to bowl fast.”

Assuming that Zaheer has chosen his words carefully, this seems to indicate that he believes that humans are ‘designed’. If they are designed by God, and Sachin is God, then we can conclude that the Mumbai batsman’s blueprint is flawed or perhaps prejudiced such that he has an easier time in the nets.

Alternatively, Zaheer may be hinting that Indian cricketers are designed by scientists through manipulation of genetic code. To us, this makes more sense. If your firm had the wherewithal to create a cricketer in this manner, it would demand a decent return on its investment.

This is an age of short-form cricket, where runs are the currency, and where long one-day series and back-to-back Tests sap the influence of those who carry out the most physical role in cricket. It simply makes no financial sense to design a fast bowler. It’s too risky an investment and the rewards simply don’t justify it.

Of course, even if Zaheer’s wrong, natural selection will still mean other sorts of cricketers predominate in this cricket ecosystem.

Zaheer Khan Operation Greggs latest

Bert has just left a comment drawing attention to Zaheer Khan’s performance this morning, pondering whether Operation Greggs has been put into practice. Operation Greggs involves plying Zaheer with meat and tatty pies until he’s bowling at Praveen Kumar pace.

Bert is right to raise this possibility, but it is worth investigating more thoroughly and thus far, we see little evidence that Operation Greggs has had any impact.

According to Hawkeye, Zaheer’s deliveries have averaged 80-odd mph thus far and he’s even hit 88.6mph with one. This is perfectly respectable.

He’s also got 2-9 at the time of writing. We move that a different pie be introduced. The man has a weakness, we just need to identify precisely what it is.

Zaheer Khan and James Anderson

We’re all pretty lucky, you know. For the next few weeks, we’re going to get Zaheer Khan one innings and then James Anderson the next. It’s like our metabolism has suddenly allowed us a curry-pizza-curry-pizza diet. No muesli.

What follows isn’t really meant to be a comparison. It’s more about celebrating both bowlers’ strengths. It’s not about which of them is better. It’s about both bowlers being ace and hopefully lopping a few chunks off some oversized batting averages. Batsmen are dicks.

Adaptability

If we had to sum up Zaheer Khan, we’d say ‘jack of all trades, master of most‘. That phrase doesn’t stand up to much scrutiny, but what does in this day and age? Capitalism? The plot of the Phantom Menace? You? Us?

James Anderson is on the Zaheer Khan path, but four years behind. He’s become effective through adding a second and third dimension to his bowling (Zaheer has five dimensions). Anderson’s first dimension was always pretty tidy, however, and it’s a dimension that comes to the fore in England.

Going the distance

Zaheer Khan is cannier. Zaheer knows it’s a marathon, not a sprint; that your third spell counts as much as your first in the grand scheme of things. He tends to conserve energy for when he needs it.

James Anderson, by contrast, has taken the ‘being ridiculously fit’ option. As quick at 5pm as he is at 11am, he’s like a Tour de France cyclist – he’s all sinew.

Zaheer also gains points for his physique in our book. Paunchiness hovers around him waiting to pounce the minute he stops running around for a living. That’s something we can all get behind.

To devious bowlers toppling spoilt batsmen! [Raises mug and then stares at the clock, willing time to go at eight times speed, like in a computer game, so that the beer hour might arrive sooner.]

We’re supporting Zaheer Khan

We’re supporting India, but we’re struggling with that because we’ve got quite a big reservation. A win for India would, to some extent, be a victory for batting over bowling and we hate batsmen.

For us, much of the joy of cricket is in the fall of wickets and we hate to see bowlers marginalised. India are guilty of this, in a way. It’s not really their fault, but they’ve got to the final largely on the solidity of their batting, not through spectacular performances with the ball.

Yuvraj Singh is India’s second-highest wicket-taker in this World Cup and that’s kind of sad. While Yuvraj is a good one-day bowler, he generally plays on a batsman’s complacency against him as much as anything. It’s a useful and worthy approach, but it should be a supporting role.

India’s top wicket-taker, however, is Zaheer Khan and he IS a bowler. In a match in subcontinental conditions, he is the best quick bowler in the world. Zaheer’s adaptability is based on the fact that he has a range of deliveries that he can call on at different times during the game.

Zaheer is an incredibly skilled bowler and we’d like to see him have the biggest influence on the World Cup final. It would mean a victory for India and a victory for bowling too.

Zaheer Khan – average record belies his class

Zaheer Khan deserves better than 2-36 and we won’t begrudge him if he gets more wickets. There are talented bowlers out there who have unflattering career records and Zaheer’s one of them.

It seems wrong to watch a bowler unveil such a range of skills and then see that he’s averaging 34. Zaheer’s had a couple of mediocre patches in his career and he has to bowl on Indian pitches half the time, but he deserves a bowling average that inspires more respect.

He swung England a new one with the new one when India toured England and he’ll swing them a new one with the old one this series. He’ll get two or three wickets an innings, bowl inspired spells for no reward and then Yuvraj Singh and Virender Sehwag will match his figures on the last day and overshadow him.

Zaheer Khan wins an ODI with the ball

Another one-day international is decided with the ball. Huzzah. It went the other way this time, however.

Zaheer Khan took 4-21 and Sri Lanka crumpled like a supermarket receipt to 142 all out. We’re increasingly thinking that if there’s swing, you want Zaheer Khan in your side.

Bowlers continued to lord it over meek batsmen when India batted, but the target was reached in no-style-at-all with seven wickets down.

This is what one-day cricket’s all about: shambling, spazzy run-chases.