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Five times the Chennai Super Kings captain trumped his opponents with out-of-the-box moves

Deivarayan Muthu26-Mar-2022Related

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Pinning down Pollard
Super Kings vs Mumbai Indians, IPL 2010 finalMumbai Indians were 136 for 6, needing 33 from two overs, with the title on the line. Kieron Pollard had just clattered Doug Bollinger for 4, 6, 4, 6 in a 22-run over, which titled the title fight Mumbai’s way. Until Dhoni intervened, having Matthew Hayden at an unorthodox straight mid-off position, in addition to having a more conventional long-off.Dhoni’s plan was to have Albie Morkel bowl yorkers at Pollard and turn his strength of hitting down the ground into a weakness. Morkel’s first ball to Pollard was thwacked past him for four. He nailed the yorker second ball, which squeezed underneath Pollard’s bat. After a dot and the run-out of Ambati Rayudu, Morkel went full once again, and Pollard could only skew a low catch to Hayden at straight mid-off. The Super Kings pressed on to win their maiden IPL title.IPL 2010 – Chennai Super Kings’ first title in the tournament•Indian Premier LeagueAt the post-match presentation, Dhoni reasoned that it was worth whisking short fine-leg to straight mid-off, given Pollard’s propensity to hit in the ‘V’. He also revealed that he had deployed a similar field against Hayden himself at a practice match in the lead-up to IPL 2008.”If you see the big-hitters of the world or powerful hitters, they don’t sweep or reverse-sweep. So I said, ‘okay what’s the point of a short fine-leg’,” Dhoni told the host broadcaster after the game. “Pollard will anyway look to hit down the ground and Morkel will look to bowl yorkers outside off. If he miscues one, he may not get the elevation. I’ve tried it once with Matthew Hayden, though. It worked at the practice game we had right at the start of the tournament. No rocket science.”Many other IPL captains subsequently took a leaf out of Dhoni’s playbook, having a fielder straight to counter the likes of Pollard. M Vijay, for example, when he was captaining the Punjab franchise in 2016, stationed himself at ultra-straight mid-off against James Faulkner.Chaos theory
Chennai Super Kings vs Kings XI Punjab, IPL 2018Super Kings slipped to 27 for 3 within five overs in pursuit of 154 on a spicy pitch in Pune. Fast bowler Ankit Rajpoot was on a hat-trick, having taken out Faf du Plessis and Sam Billings. Dhoni unleashed his chaos theory – promoting Harbhajan and Deepak Chahar ahead of himself, DJ Bravo and Ravindra Jadeja.Chahar. Chaos!•BCCIWhile Harbhajan saw off the new ball and contributed 19 off 22 balls, Chahar made a more decisive 39 off 20 balls at a strike rate of 195. Dhoni and Super Kings head coach Stephen Fleming had originally identified Chahar as a batting allrounder at Rising Pune Supergiant/s, but injury delayed his initiation into the IPL. Dhoni and Fleming reunited with Chahar at Super Kings, where he became their go-to bowler in the powerplay. In that game against Kings XI Punjab, he repaid the team management’s faith with the bat too, helping them seal the chase.”Sending in Bhajji [Harbhajan] and Chahar creates a bit of chaos,” Dhoni told the host broadcaster. “The bowlers all of a sudden bowl yorkers, offcutters, and bouncers. When [top-order] batsmen are batting, they stick to a good line and length, but against Bhajji and Chahar, they lose their line and lengths instead of sticking to the plan. Plus Bhajji and Chahar could come in handy during the playoffs.”Straightjacketing Sachin
Chennai Super Kings vs Mumbai Indians, IPL 2010 finalStopping Sachin. Not everyone could do it. Dhoni knew how•Indian Premier LeagueLet us revisit that game. Bollinger had struck early to dismiss Shikhar Dhawan, but Sachin Tendulkar stabilised Mumbai’s chase of 169, with the crowd behind him. Dhoni brought Shadab Jakati into the attack in the tenth over to give him a crack at Tendulkar. Jakati had apparently troubled Tendulkar when he was once a net bowler with the India side, so Dhoni was hoping for some control from the left-arm fingerspinner.The left-handed Abhishek Nayar, though, briefly foiled Dhoni’s plan, carting Jakati for back-to-back sixes in a 14-run over. Jakati then switched ends and eventually made the incision by hiding one away from Tendulkar’s swinging arc and having him chipping a catch to long-off.Two years later, in the 2012 Eliminator against Mumbai in Bengaluru, Dhoni tossed the new ball to Jakati, who kept Tendulkar to a run-a-ball 11. Something had to give and that something was Tendulkar running himself out. Super Kings went on to win that knockout game as well.Holding back Harbhajan
Chennai Super Kings vs Sunrisers Hyderabad, IPL 2018 Qualifier 1Super Kings had picked Harbhajan in 2018 to exploit the spin-friendly Chepauk track, but after just one game there, they had to shift base to Pune because of protests surrounding the Cauvery river water issue. Harbhajan did a good job for Super Kings in Pune, too, but in the qualifier against Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Wankhede Stadium, where Harbhajan had bowled across phases for Mumbai Indians, Dhoni didn’t use his offspin at all. Jadeja was in fine rhythm, giving up just 13 runs in his four overs for the wicket of Manish Pandey, so Dhoni didn’t need him on the day.Harbhajan Singh, not a car Dhoni needed to drive all the time•BCCI”You know, I have a lot of cars and bikes in my garage. And, I don’t ride all at a time,” Dhoni quipped. “When you have six to seven bowlers in your side, you want to see the conditions. You want to see who is batting and what is needed at that point of time.”Then, in the final against Sunrisers, Dhoni dropped Harbhajan altogether, fielding legspinner Karn Sharma, who brought with him the reputation of being a serial title-winner in the IPL and in domestic cricket. Karn came away with the prized scalp of Kane Williamson, drawing him out of the crease and having the Sunrisers captain stumped for 47 off 36 balls.Besting Chris Gayle
Chennai Super Kings vs Royal Challengers Bangalore, IPL 2011 finalChris Gayle could have taken the 2011 final away from Super Kings; he was out for a three-ball duck•AFPAfter opting to bat, Super Kings racked up 205 for 5 on the back of an M Vijay special. A red-hot Chris Gayle, though, was standing between Super Kings and back-to-back IPL titles. Gayle was the leading run-getter during that IPL and single-handedly transformed Royal Challengers’ fortunes in the tournament. Dhoni matched up R Ashwin’s offspin with the left-handed Gayle at a time when match-ups were not even a thing. After setting up Gayle with two offbreaks, Ashwin darted one into the batter and had him nicking off for a three-ball duck. Game over!”I rely a lot on the bounce, therefore a good wicketkeeper is extremely crucial,” Ashwin told the . “With Dhoni, the caught-behinds and stumpings have gone up many notches in my bowling. He understands the trajectory, the variation, and the bounce that I get.”

England opener focussed on fightback after grim campaign in Australia

Matt Roller31-Mar-2022It was hard not to be drawn into the romance of Haseeb Hameed’s England recall last year. His rise as a teenager – a thousand-run season, a fifty on Test debut, praise from Virat Kohli – preceded a dramatic fall, which saw him released by his home county, Lancashire, at 22 after his form had vanished.Reinvigorated by a move to Nottinghamshire, he started the 2021 season with twin hundreds against Worcestershire before making 112 for a County Select XI against an India attack led by Jasprit Bumrah. That was enough for him to win back his Test spot and after a false start via a first-baller on his return at Lord’s, he made half-centuries at Leeds and The Oval to earn his place on the winter’s Ashes tour.But the shine soon wore off. Before he had even arrived in Australia there were doubts as to whether Hameed’s game – in particular, his strength against spin, rather than high pace – would be suited to the conditions. He batted for nearly four hours across the first Test in making 25 and 27 but as England’s tour began to disintegrate, so did he: scores of 6, 0, 0, 7, 6 and 9 saw him dropped for the final Test, and then again for the “red-ball reset” trip to the Caribbean.Now, Hameed is back on the outside, looking out on a snowy Trent Bridge from the pavilion long room and reflecting on a tough winter. He only turned 25 in January, but his career has already had more ups and downs than the price of bitcoin.

Broad to miss Notts’ Championship opener

Stuart Broad will not play in Nottinghamshire’s opening game of the County Championship season away at Sussex next week as the club look to manage his return to cricket after a break from the game.
“He certainly won’t start, then we’ll see where we go after that,” Peter Moores, Notts’ head coach, told ESPNcricinfo. “We’re always careful with bowlers, especially after breaks. He was a real influence for us last year and having Stuart around is always positive for us.”
“I’m very hopeful that we’ll see him for the second or third game and hopefully we’ll have a full squad to pick from,” Steven Mullaney, the club captain, added. “If it was my decision, he’d have been on that tour, but it’s not. It would not surprise me one bit if he’s England’s leading wicket-taker by the end of the summer.”

“I’ve had a lot of setbacks in my short career – and even growing up as a junior I had setbacks – but one thing I’ve always been able to count on, thankfully, is finding a way to get back up from rock bottom,” Hameed says. “I guess this is another opportunity to do that.”Of course, getting dropped out of the team, and not getting selected for this most recent tour is difficult but hopefully I can count on those experiences to come back again. In my head, there is no doubt that, being 25 years old, I have got so much more to give and I’m looking forward to the future.”Hameed’s technique – and specifically his low hands, which appear better suited to low, slow pitches than those found in Australia – came under the scanner as the series wore on. He retreated further and further into his shell, repeatedly edging through to Alex Carey behind the stumps.Mark Ramprakash, who was England’s batting coach when Hameed first broke into the side, hinted in a newspaper column this week that they had picked the wrong horse for the wrong course, saying he was “absolutely convinced he would have been successful in the West Indies – certainly in Antigua and Barbados”. Hameed’s own appraisal is that the pitches in Australia were “extremely challenging”, and that his lean returns should be viewed within that context.”A lot of people speak about games being suited to certain conditions and we saw there were a couple of pretty good wickets – in the first Test matches in particular – in the West Indies,” he says. “Do I feel like I could’ve done well there? I do. As a player, of course you do. But they made that decision and it was not in my control.”I ended up speaking to Mike Hussey [who was working on the series as a broadcaster] when I didn’t play in the last Test match and he was saying he’d never seen conditions like it. I think that’s been neglected a little bit, actually – how challenging the conditions were. It was like being in England, but with an extra 10kph in the wickets… because it was nipping and seaming off the deck quite considerably.Hameed scored 80 runs in eight innings in the Ashes•Getty Images”You’ve got to add a bit of realism to it. That’s not excuses, that’s just pure facts. At the same time, do I feel like I could have done better? Of course. There were a few mistakes made, individually and as a group. We went into our shells a little bit after the first two Test matches and focused a little bit more on surviving or batting time as opposed to looking to score runs. Looking back now, I don’t think that was the right mindset, either for me or for the team.”Peter Moores, head coach at Notts, agrees with Hameed’s assessment. “It was about as tough as it gets. [He was playing on] pitches that had a bit in them for the bowlers, against one of the best attacks that’s been around for a long time, so it was tough to go in first. He learned a huge amount. I’ve said to him that it won’t get much tougher than that.”A lot of the England players, they got exposed in certain ways. No-one will ever question Has’ commitment to want to do well. Often it’s more of a technical thing that they’re getting exposed at that level, and they’ve got to come away and adjust but I’ve been really pleased with his approach. He’s a student of a game and a craftsman. He wants to master the craft of batting and he’s thrown himself right back into it and taken those lessons from that tour.”Related

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England are in transition, looking for a new managing director, head coach (or two) and potentially a captain, too, ahead of their next Test against New Zealand in June. Hameed knows that a strong start to this Championship season is the only way he can present a case for selection, and insists his focus is on the here and now.”The way I see it is that I’ve now had the opportunity to play against India and Australia in their home countries and most people would say it doesn’t get much tougher than that,” he says. “That’s a great experience for me to have in my first ten games. To have seven of those away from home, in the opposition’s backyard, will mean that I can count on those experiences to propel me forward.”There’s a series against New Zealand in June and then India are coming for that one Test they missed last year, and the likelihood is with the new people coming in, there might be a few changes again. But I’m focused now on doing as well as I can for Notts. Keeping things simple is important; you can’t aim to get into teams or put timelines on things.”It’s been good just being back. Of course it was difficult straight after [Australia] with everything that happened but I’m lucky that I’ve got good people around me and I’ve got to a place now where I’m just looking to the immediate future. I can’t think about June right now, even though I’ve obviously got that ambition to be there. I’m just trying to keep everything as simple as I can.”

Fast bowler impresses in game of more than 400 runs by keeping a clear mind amid chaos

Matt Roller10-Jul-2022Few venues in world cricket have as intimidating a reputation for T20 bowlers as Trent Bridge. The pitches are flat, the outfield is scorched and the boundaries are unforgiving: there is one relatively long pocket, where sixes require a 75-metre hit, but the square boundaries barely measure 65 metres.In that context, England’s decision to pick an extra batter in this game – they dropped Sam Curran for Phil Salt – was a gamble, one which was vindicated by their 17-run win. The combination of Liam Livingstone and Moeen Ali’s spin, sharing the fifth bowler’s allocation, was hammered, taken for 67 runs in their four overs, but Reece Topley’s spell of 3 for 22 proved decisive.Topley was the only bowler on either side to finish with an economy rate below 7.5 and was rewarded with the player-of-the-match award. ESPNcricinfo’s impact algorithm suggested that Suryakumar Yadav was the best performer by a considerable distance, but also that Topley’s wickets – he dismissed Rohit Sharma, Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer – were worth considerably more than the scorecard showed.Topley’s method was simple, hitting hard lengths and looking to cramp India’s batters for room. According to ESPNcricinfo’s ball-by-ball data, only two of his 24 balls were fuller than a good length, with the vast majority bowled into the pitch while varying his speeds. “The batters came off and said that changes of pace into the middle of the wicket were the hardest to face,” he explained.He struck twice in the powerplay, including with his first ball when Pant inside-edged a length ball into his pad and through to Jos Buttler, then with the last ball of his second over as Sharma failed to pick his slower ball and dragged a pull straight down deep midwicket’s throat. At the Ageas Bowl he had bowled three overs in the powerplay but Buttler saved his third for the 12th, when he conceded only five singles.When he returned for his final over, India needed 66 runs off the last 30 balls to seal a series sweep. Yadav was flying, dominating a partnership worth 119 in 10.1 overs with Shreyas. Buttler needed a wicket, and Topley delivered: Shreyas scurried outside leg but Topley followed him with a short ball, cramping him for room and inducing a feather through to Buttler.The rest of his over was just as cagey: he conceded just a single from four balls to Dinesh Karthik, repeatedly foxing him with his hard lengths, and while Suryakumar dabbed his last ball away for four, he had pushed the required rate up past 15 an over, which would prove insurmountable.Some cricketers spend every waking hour thinking about the game but Topley, by his own admission, is not like that. He admitted himself that he is “not a massive cricket-watcher” and was taken aback by Suryakumar’s innings, full of “some amazing shots – shots I haven’t seen before”, but he stuck to his clear plan, seemingly helped by his ability to switch off and “isolate every ball”.Related

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“Bowling these days is a bit of a thankless task but you’ve just got to put your hand up and be brave,” he said. “One day it doesn’t go your way and you’re the villain and you have to get yourself up for the next game to try and be the hero. Bowlers nowadays have almost got more to learn mentally about T20 cricket – perhaps more than the skills.”There’s other games where things don’t fall your way and you get 1 for 40, or whatever. You’ve got to ride the high when things fall your way because the game is pretty fickle and there’s a lot of days where it doesn’t.”Topley did not feature for England at last year’s T20 World Cup but has taken the opportunities that have come his way this year: first in Barbados against West Indies and now against India: he has seven wickets in six T20Is this year, with an excellent economy rate of exactly seven an over.He is part of the squad that will play next week’s ODIs against India and is now certain to win further chances against South Africa. He bowls in the mid-80s mph (130s kph) and generates steep bounce thanks to his height, which could be an asset in all phases of an innings in Australia come this year’s World Cup.”Since the start of this year, I think I’ve taken all the opportunities that have come my way,” he said. “But [with a] new coach and a new captain, there’s new people to try and impress. In my head, it’s back to square one – try to impress the right people. But ultimately it’s about getting wins as a team and trying, with every game, to work out how we’re getting one step closer to trying to win the World Cup in October.”

The 2019 rugby side led by Kolisi was the first truly representative national side to achieve something great. This cricket team could be the second

Firdose Moonda25-Feb-20234:01

Moonda: A World Cup win for South Africa at home will lift the nation

There’s magic in the air in Cape Town and it’s coming from the cricket stadium.At 11am on Saturday morning, a queue of people wound down Campground Road to buy tickets for the T20 World Cup final. Never before has a senior South African cricket team reached a World Cup final, never mind on home soil. Less than three hours later, ‘sold out’ signs had been stuck on the windows outside the Newlands ticket office windows. Never before has a ground reached capacity for a women’s sporting event in this country.In fact, most of the interest in World Cups is reserved for the Springboks, the national rugby team, who have reached three finals and won them all. Their most recent successful captain, Siya Kolisi, is an ambassador for this Women’s T20 World Cup and was in attendance on Friday, sprinkling his stardust at the semi-final. He’ll be back as supporter No.1 on Sunday and doing his best to stay in the shadows of a South African team who have become superstars in their own right.Related

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Take Tazmin Brits. She was due to represent South Africa at the 2012 Olympic Games as a javelin thrower but she thought her sporting career ended when she momentarily glanced at her cell phone while driving, misjudged a bend in the road and rolled her car. She wasn’t wearing a safety belt, which resulted in her being flung out of the vehicle, probably a far better outcome than if she was trapped inside, as it collided into a tree which fell on top of the car. Brits was spared a broken neck but her pelvis was fractured in five places, her bladder burst, her colon was torn and she needed two weeks in ICU and two months in hospital before she could train again. She was 19 years old and never made it to the Games. Instead, she took up cricket.Brits made her debut in May 2018 and though she’d scored three fifties in 17 innings before the 2020 T20 World Cup, she didn’t make the squad. She was a late inclusion into their Commonwealth Games playing group and contemplated changing careers out of sport entirely.

Followers in the US can watch the Women’s T20 World Cup final LIVE on ESPN+

“When people leave you at home more often you kind of think maybe I should save the nation and go to become a teacher or something different,” she said after the semi-final. Lizelle Lee’s retirement has opened up a more permanent spot for her and she’s seized her chance at this tournament, with successive half-centuries in crucial games and four stunning catches in the semi-final – a record for an outfielder and a testament to the athleticism that never went away.Brits has the Olympic Rings tattooed on her right bicep, a reminder of a dream deferred. After her Player-of-the-match performance in the semi-final against England, she joked that she would add the Protea badge to it, if the team won. Maybe even if they don’t. A reminder, regardless of the result, of a dream come true. And she’s not the only one who will already feel that way.This South African women’s team and Siya Kolisi’s Springboks have a lot in common•ICC/Getty ImagesShabnim Ismail, who worked a job as a credit-card machine technician because cricket wasn’t a career choice for her when she started playing, 16 years ago, expressed the same sentiments of achievement. She emerged from what fellow international and neighbour Beuran Hendricks described to ESPNcricinfo as a “fairly rough,” neighbourhood in a suburb called Cravenby, an area in the Cape that is known for its high crime rate. Young adults can easily “go down the wrong path,” Hendricks said.Her mother nurtured her interest in sport and supported her decision to keep playing cricket, which has seen Ismail become the fastest bowler in the women’s game. She was in attendance when Ismail delivered the 128kph fireball that took England’s batters by surprise and played a key role in changing the tempo of a run-chase that was getting away from South Africa. Ismail maintained a calm that South African players in pressure situations are not known for and she passed it on to Nadine de Klerk, whom she mentored through tough middle overs in the semi-final.Ismail is a leader without a title, the oldest and most experienced in the South African side and a key counsel for Sune Luus, who took over the captaincy in temporary capacity in 2019.Almost four years later, Luus was still a stand-in as South Africa continued to wait on Dane van Niekerk’s availability, and started to get restless. She admitted that she had been unable to stamp her own signature on the side because she considered herself a placeholder, rather than the permanent captain. Before this tournament, she was confirmed as what she says is the “official captain,” and is now confident enough to articulate that she believes she is the one who can take this side forward.”The role of captaincy hasn’t been easy over the last couple of years – being a stand-in captain for however long. It was always going to be difficult, filling the shoes of Dane,” she said. “The way the game’s going and with the team we have at the moment – it’s a very young squad and it was very exciting to see talent and players coming in. It’s leading a new generation. Players have come and gone and we’re just looking forward.”Tazmin Brits, Marizanne Kapp and Shabnim Ismail thank the fans after the semi-final win•Getty ImagesHilton Moreeng, South Africa’s coach for the last decade, will know that too. From being taught to play cricket by a woman to being at the helm of the national women’s team’s progression from amateur to professional and all the way to a World Cup final, Moreeng has come full circle. Even if South Africa win the World Cup, it’s difficult to see him continuing in this job with nothing left to achieved, but he should be in line for many others as he keeps setting the bar higher.Moreeng is not only South Africa’s most successful limited-overs coach but is also the first black African head coach of a national team. He has also overseen what appears to have been a mostly organic transformation of the national women’s team, something that continues to cause angst among the men. Where the women’s team differs is that they do not source the bulk of their players from the small, elite schools’ pool, like the men do, but from development programs – proof that investment into grassroots sport works.The best example of that is Ayabonga Khaka. She is from the rural village of Middledrift in the Eastern Cape, also home to fast bowler Mfuneko Ngam. Khaka is a product of his academy, established at the University of Fort Hare, where she was also studying Human Movement Sciences. From the same province, but a completely different part of it, is Marizanne Kapp, who went to school at Hoerskool DF Malherbe. She is their most accomplished alumnus.In Kapp, Khaka, and Ismail lies a small part of the story of this South African women’s team. They are diverse in race, class and culture. For a country that has always been divided along those lines, that is a massive inspiration and fosters a sense of hope that only the Springboks have otherwise conjured. The 2019 rugby side led by Kolisi and coached by Rassie Erasmus, was the first truly representative national side to achieve something great. This South African cricket team could be the second.On one hand, it’s an enormous burden to carry; on the other, it’s the only way a South African team can embody the spirit on which its democracy was founded, the spirit of Ubuntu. Explained literally it means “I am because you are,” but the words don’t do justice to the feeling.Ubuntu is the way two South Africans’ eyes meet in an airport hall when one has heard the other saying they are boarding “now-now.” It’s the three-part handshake of grip, swing palm, grip and snap that is effortless to South Africans and impossible for most others. It’s the collective groans and cheers every time a rolling blackout starts and stops and the many times they have “made a plan,” no matter how difficult the situation. Ubuntu is what you experience at a Sunday afternoon braai and this Sunday, it will be what we will experience at what could be the biggest party the country has ever hosted.

Ever since his run-in with Virat Kohli, the LSG quick has had to cope with fans taunting him on social media and on the field

Deivarayan Muthu25-May-20232:08

Moody: ‘Naveen has three versions of the slower offcutter’

Rashid Khan. Mohammad Nabi. Mujeeb Ur Rahman. Noor Ahmad. In recent years, Afghanistan’s spinners have been in demand at the IPL, and this season a seamer has joined them in the spotlight. After making a splash in the Caribbean Premier League, T20 Blast, Bangladesh Premier League and Lanka Premier League, Naveen-ul-Haq earned his first IPL contract this season and emerged as one of the bright spots for Lucknow Super Giants, taking 11 wickets in eight games at an average of 19.89 and economy rate of 7.82.In the Eliminator against Mumbai Indians in Chennai on Wednesday, Naveen claimed 4 for 38, but a batting collapse in a chase of 183 put Super Giants out of the tournament.”Yeah, it was an achievable target, and the wicket was playing quite well,” Naveen said after the game. “I think in between we couldn’t handle the pressure and we gave away three-four wickets in quick succession. That was the turning point in the game.Related

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“To be honest, it [my personal performance] was good. But we could have done better as a team. Individual performances don’t count. At the end of the day, our team’s goal was to win the trophy. So, my performance comes second, and it was a good season for me. I’ve learnt quite a few things from this IPL and [will] hopefully come back stronger.”While his captain Krunal Pandya and Yash Thakur kept offering pace to Mumbai’s batters in the powerplay, Naveen assessed the Chennai conditions better and slowed it up. Suryakumar Yadav and Cameron Green couldn’t manufacture pace for themselves. After tricking Suryakumar with a 107kph legcutter, Naveen went wide of the crease and snuck in an even slower offcutter (105kph) through the defences of Green.”You have to assess the conditions and see what they offer,” Naveen said. “I think the pitch was offering a bit of help. It wasn’t like we were bowling three-four slower ones in an over, but just to keep the batsmen guessing you have to vary your pace and vary your line and length. It counts in T20 cricket – it’s a fast format and you have to adjust quickly. You have to be one step ahead of the batter.”Ahead of the 2021 T20 World Cup in the UAE, Naveen had spoken to ESPNcricinfo about getting his slower balls to dip sharply at batters.Shutting out the noise – Naveen-ul-Haq celebrates Rohit Sharma’s wicket•BCCI”Yes, I’ve worked a lot on my slower balls,” Naveen had said. “In the [T20] Blast you play a home game and then an away game against the same opposition. Once, when I played one team, they started targeting my slower balls – they were standing back and waiting for them. This stuck in my mind and I worked it out during the tournament that if teams are standing back for my slower balls, then I will bowl fewer.”Then, at the back end of the tournament, most of my wickets were not off slower ones. Maybe, I bowled three-four slower balls in my four-over spell. Earlier, I would be bowling ten slower balls in a four-over spell. Since they were lining me up for them, I changed it up. So slower balls became like a surprise [weapon].”Tom Moody, the former Australia allrounder and an analyst for ESPNcricinfo, was impressed with Naveen’s variety.”What you find with his offcutter is he has got various levels of that offcutter as well,” Moody said on ESPNcricinfo’s T20 Time Out. “He’s got a very slow offcutter that dips and it’s a bit like fine spin bowlers. They spin the ball a millimetre, then they spin it an inch and then they spin it four inches.”That was the genius of [Shane] Warne. Particularly when Shane Warne had his shoulder problems he couldn’t rely on his flipper and his wrong’un as much as he did in the early parts of his career. His great skill was you didn’t know how much his legbreak was going to spin and with that beautiful curve. And the same with Naveen. In this case, it’s not just an offcutter; he has three different versions of that offcutter.”

“If my body feels well, hopefully, I’ll come and join the Afghanistan team and play in the ODI World Cup [in India]”Naveen-ul-haq

Naveen has also had to deal with pressure from off the field. Since he exchanged words with Virat Kohli during an ill-tempered game between Royal Challengers Bangalore and Super Giants, the crowd has been chanting Kohli’s name to rile Naveen up. Naveen, though, has shut out the noise and on Wednesday he celebrated each wicket with his fingers in his ears.”I enjoy it. I like the crowd chanting his [Virat Kohli’s] name or any other player’s name,” Naveen said. “It gives me passion to play well for my team.”Well, I don’t concentrate on the noise from the outside or anything else. I just focus on my own process. It’s not like if the crowd is chanting or anyone is saying something… it doesn’t affect me. As professional sportsmen, you have to take this in your stride. One day you will not do your best for the team and the fans will give it to you. On another day, you will do a special thing for your team and the same people can chant your name. So, [it’s] basically a part and parcel of the game.”Naveen is currently on a break from ODI cricket – his last game in the format was in January 2021 – but he hopes to return for the World Cup in India later this year.”For now, I’m not playing ODI cricket,” Naveen said. “I’ve taken a break since 12 months ago. I’ll see my body condition and see how I’m going. If my body feels well, hopefully, I’ll come and join the Afghanistan team and play in the ODI World Cup [in India]. So, yeah, fingers crossed. We will see.”

Podcast: We review the India vs Australia Test series and look ahead to the WTC final

ESPNcricinfo staff18-Mar-2023Andrew McGlashan and Karthik Krishnaswamy join Karthik Iyer to look back at the Border-Gavaskar Trophy Test series, which had a lot of excitement for three of the four Tests, till a lifeless Ahmedabad pitch spoilt the fun. Here, they pick the best and worst performers and performances, and also look ahead to the World Test Championship final, to be contested by the same two sides.