Nathan Lyon has been an underrated match winner for Australia in the recent years. The off-spinner has the ability to strike at the crucial junctures in a game and his wickets tend to have a massive impact on the eventual outcome. Lyon had a fantastic test series against the West Indies at home last summer as he was among the wickets.
With a challenging tour of Sri Lanka lined up for the Kangaroos, Lyon will definitely be Australia’s go through bowler. On the slow and low Sri Lankan pitches, Lyon’s performance will be constantly under the radar as an off day for him could have disastrous consequences for Australia. Lyon, in his chat with cricket.com.au, stated that he was looking forward to interacting with Sri Lankan spin legend Muttiah Muralitharan in order to get an insight about Sri Lanka.
“John Davison and myself were just talking today about a few comments that Murali said about how you should be bowling over on the sub-continent,” said Lyon. “So I’m looking forward to putting those into play and hopefully, it will be good to catch up with Murali again over there. “I’ll see if I can tee up to have a coffee at the hotel or even if we can get him down to a training session would be fantastic.”
Lyon elaborated on the exact kind of tips he needed from Muralitharan. “It’s not so much technical, I’ve got a little bit different action to Murali,” Lyon said. “It’s more mindset, and attacking and defending in sub-continental conditions. “Just understanding the game, and somebody of his quality and what he was able to do in sub-continent conditions was pretty spectacular so if I can learn off him by just listening to him and talking to him then I’m heading in the right direction.”
“Going technical, I’m more consistent with my bowling. “I’m a lot more confident in my skill – back when I made my debut I was quite raw, didn’t really know what was going on, I was just riding the rollercoaster. “Now I understand the game, I understand my role in the team, so I’m feeling really confident and looking forward to going over there,” Lyon concluded.