Mohammed Shami: India’s bowling Badshah who’s gone from a connoisseur’s delight to a mass hero | Cricket-world-cup News

Before this World Cup, Mohammed Shami was a delight for the connoisseurs. The gliding run-up, the slick load-up and release, the pian’s dexterity of fingers, the divine alignment of the seam upon release, the deviations the spherical leather made at the whim of his mind and the palms. But this World Cup, he became a hero of the masses, when Shami demystified himself, when it did not require `the lens of an expert’ to dissect the beauty of his bowling, when he stamped his art and craft into India’s march into the finals, when the world waited for his turn to bowl, as they wait for Kohli’s moment to bat, or once they longed for Sachin Tendulkar.Rarely ever has he disappointed them. His spells essentially set up the game. In the first, he consumed the openers Devon Conway and Rachin Ravindra; in the second, at an even more critical juncture, he ejected Kane Williamson and Tom Latham; in the last he stubbed out the dying embers of a New Zealand victory, dismissing centurion Daryl Mitchell for his second five-for of the tournament. Two more followed for a tally of 7. His stats now read a scarcely believable 23 wickets at 9.13 in six games this World Cup.
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But as much as the numbers, it’s the experience of watching him that defines this World Cup. When Rohit Sharma first summoned him, Mohammed Siraj would have felt gutted when he heard the deafening applause. Two tight overs he had bowled, but he was made to feel like he had endured the most horrendous evening of his career. The wait begins, and anticipation crackles, when Rohit signals Shami to bowl. Shami lumbers in from his outpost, unhurriedly hands his cap over to the umpire, hurriedly sets his field and then briskly marks him run-up, an impish smile dwelling on his face.
At this precise moment, the chattering crowd stops their chatter, keeps the paper-bowl of popcorn aside, squeezes the smartphones into the pockets and trains their eyes on the man bending into his run-up. Quietness engulfs the arena of 40,000-odd fervent fans.
It’s the quietness of hope, it’s the silence that accompanies the impulse that something special would unfold. And as Shami gets into his short, brisk strides, the noise erupts explosively, a harsh piercing screeching that hurts the ears. For a split-second, the silence returns, that is the time it took the audience to process that Conway had nicked Shami behind. And once the sequence regers in the mind, they explode again.The same sequence played out as he picked four more wickets.

The eyes, the ears, the mind, the heart, everything converges into him. There seems to be nothing as pure as the crowd cheering for Shami this World Cup. It’s Shami-mania. No other fast bowler—not even the wondrous Jasprit Bumrah—has wowed and wooed the crowd as much as Shami has this tournament, transcending love and loyalties. They wait for him, wait for the gesture from Rohit Sharma to warm-up. Bumrah is the superstar, Shami the cult-hero, the man of fire and ice, hope and heartbeat, the pulse and throb, the showstopper and show-runner.
India’s fast-bowling is no longer a one-man band. Rohit could throw the ball to any of his primed pace-trio, but Shami is the fulcrum. It’s the promise of his destructibility, at any juncture of the match, with the new, semi-new or the old ball, that emboldens his bowling colleagues, even his batsmen, and even his captain. At the back of the mind, Rohit, when free-stroking, knows that there is Shami to steam in, whittle out the opposition batsmen in case of a low-score. He affords Bumrah and Siraj the license to attack.
Thunderous third seamer
It’s hard to think of a third seamer that has enjoyed Shami-scale of aura. The great late Malcolm Marshall used to when he burst forth, before he became the new-ball shearer default. At various times, Waqar Younis, Wasim Akram and Shoaib Akhtar have all donned the role with dinction. But more often than not, the unwritten law was that the best bowlers took the new-ball, unless someone was anointed an enforcer. But Shami clearly is not one its strict definition, though his role is so encompassing to be straitjacketed conventional norms.
Cricket – ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 – Semi-Final – India v New Zealand – Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai, India – November 15, 2023 India’s Mohammed Shami celebrates with Rohit Sharma after taking the wicket of New Zealand’s Lockie Ferguson to win the match and advance to the finals REUTERS/Adnan Abidi
He, in a sense, has rewritten the concept of the third seamer, as a workhorse deputed to stifle the batsmen into the jackpot-smashing thoroughbred hammering wickets away. To borrow a football phraseology, a False 3. He is, in this regard, a sui generis,Most Read
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The influence of Shami could be better measured through a batting analogy. In the peak years of Australia’s white-ball supremacy, their most important batsman was neither Adam Gilchr nor his two partners, Mark Waugh or Matthew Hayden, but Ricky Ponting. At a time when most teams slotted the anchor-accumulators at three, here was Ponting inflicting more sustained damage than Gilchr and his friends.

It is a moment in time when Shami’s talent seems inexhaustible, for you never seem to get to the bottom of it. now, batsmen world over might have pored endlessly into his footages, micro-dissected every movement of his. Yet, they can’t get to the bottom of his genius, they can’t get a measure of his craft.
The only paradox is that it has taken the audience too long to appreciate the genius of Shami. Among the three, he was the earliest to represent his country, back in 2013, a time when Bumrah was just making heads turn and toes shake, and Siraj transitioning from tennis ball to leather-ball cricket. Perhaps, Shami made himself easily forgotten. Not for him the tattoos and Ferraris. Not for him the glitz of high-life. He shrunk himself from attention, though he kept grabbing wickets, kept adding more layers into his game and kept leaping into cricketing immortality, evolving from a connoisseur’s delight to a mass hero.