Perhaps it is a curse to be fast bowler in India. They start with a bang, flourish for a few months and disappear from the frame altogether. The trend was started by Munaf Patel, continued with the likes of RP Singh, Sreesanth,Irfan Pathan and Praveen Kumar. The current torchbearer of this club is Ishant Sharma.
Everybody knows the talent of this guy. It was in full display during the India vs. Australia tour in 2007. No Indian cricket fan can forget his spell against the best batsman of the world at that time – RICKY PONTING. People thought and started believing he is the next Kapil Dev . Believe me, they say it to any Indian fast bowler who takes a 5 wicket haul even once. The man they are compared to stayed fit such that he missed only one match in his entire career, that too due to disciplinary issue. But his talent was on the wane ever since. IPL contributed to a certain extent. He was bought for a whopping sum by KKR for season 1. Bowling in shorter formats of the game did not come naturally to Ishant. He had to develop more variations like the out swinger and slower ball. Doing so he lost his stock ball the in swinger. His performances dipped and at one point of time his wrist position went awry. Another reason was too much tinkering with his bowling by these coaches. He probably listened to one coach too many and looked a confused person. The scheduling and the selection process also contributed to a certain extent. Had he been reserved for the test matches like the Aussies have keep Peter Siddle, who knows he might not have lost his mojjo.
No bowler has frustrated Indian fans as Ishant. He has the perennial backing of his captain. MS Dhoni obviously wants Ishant to use his height to trouble batsmen like Morne Morkel does. But he has not learnt from his experiences and keeps making the same mistake again and again. For a person who has played 50 tests he ought to be the strike bowler, but instead has ended with the ignominy of being the bowler with the worst average to have played 50 tests.
Yes, there might be performances like today which would be once in a blue moon. But he needs to do this on a regular basis. Since India has a strike bowler in Mohammed Shami now, at least if Ishant does not take wickets he can at least one end up building pressure. Being the senior pro after Zaheer Khan in this setup he should know when to attack and when to bowl steady. We sincerely hope the 6 for against New Zealand yesterday is an indication of good things to come. Indian cricket would be delightful if he rejuvenates himself like Mitchell Johnson and comes up with more performances like these.
