There were many top-class bowling performances at the ODI cricket in the year of 2015. Some of those were gone in vain due to the lack of support from the other teammates.
The top five of those unsuccessful incredible bowling performances are discussed briefly in the following:-
5. Reece Topley (England vs Pakistan at Abu Dhabi, 11th November): – It was the first ODI of four-match ODI series between Pakistan and England in UAE. England were defending their small total of 216 runs against Pakistan in the 2nd part of the match. The new young left-arm pacer Reece Topley showed his class in this match. He made a collapse in the Pakistan top order and grabbed first three wickets. He ended the match with an impressive figure of 9-1-26-3 but failed to make the match for the England team due to lack of other bowlers support. Pakistan won the match quite comfortably by 6 wickets with the help of a brilliant hundred from Mohammad Hafeez and a decent half-century from Babar Azam.
4. Graeme Cremer (Afghanistan vs Zimbabwe at Sharjah, 25th December): – The Zimbabwean leg-spinner bowled brilliantly in the Christmas Day with ended a figure of 9.5-2-20-5. He took four wickets in his last four overs as Zimbabwe restricted Afghanistan team at just 131 runs. Yet Zimbabwe couldn’t reach to the small target and ended 49 runs behind from the Afghanistan score. Cremer’s superb effort went in vain at the end of the day due to the batting failure.
3. Sunil Narine (Sri Lanka vs West Indies at Colombo, 1st November): – This performance happened from Sunil Narine just before the suspension from the international cricket due to the illegal bowling action. It was the opening encounter of the three-match ODI series between Sri Lanka and West Indies in Sri Lanka. In this rain-interrupted match, West Indies put a target of 163 runs from 26 overs in front of the home team. Sri Lanka was looking comfortable to chasing that total before coming off a furious spell from this Caribbean bowler. Narine picked up three wickets in the 19th over of that innings and brought the match in an interesting position. However the Lankans survived at the end as they grabbed a victory by 1 wicket with 7 balls to spare but Narine finished the match with the figure of 6-0-21-3.
2. Wahab Riaz (Australia vs Pakistan at Adelaide, 20th March):- “The Scoreboard is an ass”-this famous quote can be proved as a truth specially for this match. Scoreboard would tell that Australia made a comfortable victory but it couldn’t say that how Wahab Riaz put Aussie batsmen into the trouble. Defending a small total of 214 runs in the 3rd quarter-final of the 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup, Wahab Riaz bowled some furious spell in this match. First he picked up two wickets in his first two overs and then he bowled with a furious attitude continuously, specially against Shane Watson. He was unlucky to get more wickets due to some bad fielding from his fellow players. He ended the figure of 9-0-54-2, which was not showing his class of bowling. Australia won the match by 6 wickets but also realize that how they were lucky to survive.
1. Mitchell Starc (New Zealand vs Australia at Auckland, 28th February): – It was one of the best matches in this calendar year. In the Pool A game of the 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup, Australia was defending a small total of 151 runs against New Zealand at Auckland. New Zealand started in a thrashing style as they were looking to chase down that tiny total with a huge margin. But everything was changed in a sudden moment when Australian pacer Mitchell Starc started to bowl with the unplayable style. The left-arm pacer grabbed 6 wickets but was just an inch away to achieve an unforgettable victory. He finished with 9-0-28-6 as New Zealand won the match by just 1 wicket with more than 25 overs to spare.
