The Aussie with an English family, James Pattinson, talks about the importance of having a little mongrel, among other things

Interview by Scott Oliver16-Jul-2017You took 5 for 27 on Test debut and won Man of the Match, but you have missed a lot of cricket since then. Has that been tough to deal with?

It’s obviously frustrating to be injured, but I’ve had the opportunity to play Test cricket – close to 20 Tests – and I’m still only 27, which is quite young, so that’s a positive. When you’re thrown into Test cricket at such a young age, it’s always going to be hard on the body, but hopefully I can get some consistent form and have a good run at it now. You have to try and take the positives out of negatives sometimes, and hopefully the fact that I haven’t played a lot of Test cricket might help me at the back end of the career. It’s been good to get out there for Notts and help put some consistency back in my game.Who were your fast-bowling heroes growing up?
I loved watching Dale Steyn bowl. Then getting to play against him was something pretty special – seeing the way he moves and goes about things. And obviously, being an Australian, seeing Brett Lee and Glenn McGrath bowl in tandem was pretty exciting.What did you think when your brother got picked for England? Was that weird? Did he cop a bit from you?

Not really. I was pretty excited for him. He’s a class bowler, but he took a different path to what I did in terms of not playing first-class cricket till he was in his late twenties. But he’s always had the talent. It was just about whether he wanted to do it enough. Obviously playing over here and being English – he was dominating that year, so he was in the right place at the right time, although something he didn’t really expect would happen.

“With my family being English, we watched a lot of footie growing up. And I’m a Man United fan. Beckham was pretty much my hero growing up”

Darren went roofer-cricketer-greyhound trainer. If you were going to get into an unusual career after retirement, what would it be?

I’d probably go into the building industry. I’m doing some study at the moment.Do you keep an eye on the speed gun when you’re bowling?

Not really. Try not to. You just try to feel if you’re in good rhythm. There’s a lot of talk about people bowling fast, but most fast bowlers bowl fast when they’re really relaxed and have good rhythm.What’s the best spell you’ve bowled so far?

Obviously getting that five-for on debut, helping to win a Test match, was pretty rewarding.You look like you’re fond of a sledge. Who has copped the biggest serve from you?

I wouldn’t say anyone’s really copped a serve. I just like to show that I’m there. I think that batters have it pretty easy these days, don’t they, with the wickets and the size of the bats, so you’ve got to make it difficult for them. I’ve always been competitive. Once you get out on the field, you try and give everything. My brother was the same. Sometimes you do push the line, but you don’t try to: you want to win the game of cricket and that’s what happens.Pattinson drives on his way to 80 in the 2016-17 Shield final•Getty ImagesWhat’s the most important quality for a fast bowler?

I think it’s a mixture. You’ve got to have aggression. A lot of the best fast bowlers have been quite in your face. Then the will to win – the to win – is something you need to have. It’s a hard job to come in on the last day of a Test match and your body’s sore and you’ve got to try and get ten wickets. Bowlers are the ones that win you games, so you’ve got to have that bit of mongrel in you to want to do that. That’s probably why you get a lot of satisfaction when you bowl fast: taking ten wickets on the last day is one of those great feelings.Who’s your best mate in cricket?

I’ve got a few, but probably John Hastings from Victoria. I lived with him when I was 18 and he’s been there right through my career. Then there’s my brother as well.You’re flying long-haul to the UK for an Ashes tour. Which team-mate do you want to be sat next to on the plane?

You don’t really get to sit next to anyone nowadays: you’re in business class. But probably James Faulkner.If you were picking a World XI, who would be first name on the team sheet?
Probably Virat Kohli.

“There’s a lot of talk about people bowling fast, but most fast bowlers bowl fast when they’re really relaxed and have good rhythm”

Australia has more than its fair share of deadly creatures. Have you ever had any run-ins or close shaves?

There’s a few snakes on my brother’s farm, where he trains his greyhounds. They’re not too scary once you just let them go. Oh, I went barramundi fishing about a year ago near Darwin and we got chased by a big crocodile.If you’ve got control of the team stereo, what’s being played?

Miley Cyrus has a few good songs.Which of your team-mates is a fashion car crash?

Luke Fletcher is still wearing fluoro orange Hugo Boss shirts from about 20 years ago.Which of your team-mates is the most fun on a night out?
There’s a fair few. Left-arm spinner from Victoria, Jon Holland, is one of the best circuiters. He’s probably the most value.Who’s the last to the bar to buy a round of drinks?
Matthew Wade. He’s tight as.You’re cooking to impress: what dish are you going for?

Barbecue.”It’s been good to get out there for Notts and help put some consistency back in my game”•Getty ImagesA few years ago Shane Warne copped a bit of flak for that “ultimate party” painting, featuring everyone from Jack Nicholson to JFK, Muhammad Ali to Michael Clarke, and Elvis to Dimi Mascarenhas. If you commissioned one, who’d be on it?

Probably David Beckham. With my family being English, we watched a lot of footie growing up. And I’m a Man United fan. He was pretty much my hero growing up.An Ashes winter: have you forgiven your Notts new-ball partner, Stuart Broad, for not walking at Trent Bridge in 2013?
Oh yeah. If you get given out, then you walk. If not, you don’t. But he’s been fantastic to play with. But I’m looking forward to doing battle with him, hopefully, if I get the chance.What’s the best innings you’ve played?

I got 80 in the Shield final this year. We were in a little bit of trouble, and we went on to win, so that was pretty satisfying.Would you be more nervous bowling the last over in a World Cup final with 10 to defend, or sitting on 99 not out at Lord’s in an Ashes Test?

Definitely bowling. That would be pretty nerve-wracking.Who’s the best captain you have played under?
Either Cameron White or Ricky Ponting.Whose wicket has given you the most pleasure?

Sachin Tendulkar at the SCG.If you could be a professional at another sport, what would it be?
Football. English football.Which rule in cricket would you love to change?
More than two bouncers per over.If you were stranded on a desert island, what three things would you bring?
My wife, our dog, and a lot of food.

Nathan Lyon has defended his controversial pre-Ashes comments about Matt Prior and wanting to end England players’ careers

Brydon Coverdale at the Gabba24-Nov-20171:45

‘I thought you guys were smarter than to fall for that’ – Lyon explains trash talk

Australia’s spinner Nathan Lyon has defended his controversial pre-Ashes comments, joking that he had successfully diverted attention and pressure from debutant Cameron Bancroft and wicketkeeper Tim Paine, who is playing his first Test for seven years.On Monday, Lyon suggested that he would be happy if Australia ended the careers of some of England’s players during this series, and claimed that former England wicketkeeper Matt Prior had wanted to go home during the 2013-14 Ashes because he was “scared”. Prior called Lyon’s comments “laughable”.”Well, I took a lot of pressure off Tim Paine and Cameron Bancroft, so I thought you guys were a little bit smarter than that,” Lyon said after the second day’s play in Brisbane. “It is what it is. I’m not going to stand back from what I said.”Lyon declined to be drawn on whether his comments about Prior in particular were unkind. “Let’s go, next question,” he said.Whatever the case, the storm around Lyon’s comments did no harm to his bowling form. Despite finishing with only 2 for 78 in England’s first innings, Lyon bowled outstandingly, turning the ball sharply from his first ball on day one. England managed only 2.16 an over off Lyon, whose sky-high confidence was also shown by his sharp direct-hit run-out of James Vince on the first day.”My confidence has grown a large amount over the last 14 months,” he said. “I’ve worked hard in the nets with John Davison and I’ve really nailed down my consistency and knowing my game inside out, and knowing what works really well for me. The comments that I said before the match, it has nothing to do with the way I’m bowling now. It’s a team game. I know my role in the Australian cricket team.”I know I’m a leader, I know I’m one of the most experienced guys in that change room. If I can go out there and share my experience with the younger guys, then hopefully we can put Australian cricket in a good place. I’m very confident with where my bowling is at, at the moment. I feel like I’m bowling very well. The way it’s coming out of my hand, it’s probably coming out the best it’s ever come out. I know my role and I’m looking forward to the rest of this series.”Lyon said he had been surprised by the spin and lack of pace in the Gabba surface from the first day. Although he has had success at the Gabba in the past, rarely has he found such assistance from so early in the match.”I’ve never seen the Gabba spin this much,” he said. “I’ve seen it spin before, but not the amount I was able to generate out there. It’s probably a tad softer to what we’re used to. Today was probably more like a typical day one wicket for the Gabba, so hopefully it will harden up over the next couple of days, there’ll be more pace in the wicket.”The lack of pace in the pitch also had the effect of negating Australia’s plans to pepper England’s batsmen with short bowling, as Mitchell Johnson had done in 2013-14. When Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood did dig the ball in, it rarely reach head height, but Lyon said it was still pleasing to see the way the fast men had operated to prevent England from getting away.”Our bowlers have taken a lot of confidence out of that, especially on a slow wicket, that we were able to stick to our plans and not go away from that as a bowling group. I think the boys are pretty proud, but they’re also pretty excited to hopefully come across some fast decks around the summer to really see how the plan goes.”

Injury had deprived him from his fans, but on Saturday, those familiar wristy flicks were back. So were the deft glides behind point. For a moment, it seemed like he’d never even left

Karthik Krishnaswamy in Nagpur25-Nov-2017It was a moment of consolation on a long and thankless day for Rangana Herath. He had just gone over the wicket, to try and give M Vijay, batting on 128 at that point, something new to think about. Vijay padded away his first ball from that angle, speared flat into whatever little rough existed outside his leg stump. He aimed a sweep at the second one, a loopy full-toss, and top-edged to short fine leg.Vijay let out a cry of anguish, and smashed his bat into the turf, wielding it like a scythe, and continued to curse at himself as he walked off the field.Not for the first time in his career, a moment’s indiscretion against spin had cost Vijay the chance to turn an impressive score into a monumental one. At the Gabba in December 2014, he was caught behind on 144 off Nathan Lyon while coming down the pitch in search of a big hit. Earlier this year, in Hyderabad, he had been bowled around his legs on 108 while trying to lap-sweep Taijul Islam. A couple of months later, in Ranchi, he had been stumped on 82, with three balls left for lunch, while looking to go big against Steve O’Keefe.Vijay grew up idolising Mark Waugh, and along with some of the Australian’s easy elegance, he seems to have picked up the curse of not being able to score double-hundreds. Waugh made 20 Test centuries and finished with a top score of 153; Vijay has 10 hundreds now, and a best of 167.”Yeah, I really want to,” he said, when asked at the end of the day’s play if he’s been yearning to make a really big score. “I’ve been trying for a while now. It should come one day, and I’m waiting for that, and yeah, I was actually mentally and physically fit today. It could have been happening in this match. Hopefully in the next [opportunity].”It wasn’t a double, but it was 128 high-quality runs, each of them a reminder of everything India might have missed over the last eight months and four Test matches, if they hadn’t been blessed with an unprecedented depth of options for the opening slots. India have only rarely had two top-class Test openers playing at the same time. They’ve never before had three.With Shikhar Dhawan sitting out for personal reasons, Vijay slotted back in. Right from the first ball he faced late on day one – a probing, fourth-stump ball from Suranga Lakmal that he left alone, almost inevitably – it was like he hadn’t been away, hadn’t been recuperating from surgery on a wrist that had troubled him all through the 2016-17 season.When KL Rahul chopped on in the fourth over of India’s innings, the feeling intensified. Vijay had never really gone away; he had been batting alongside Cheteshwar Pujara all along.M Vijay and Cheteshwar Pujara bring up their 10th century stand•ICCNo partnership of 209 can feel inevitable, but this one came close. At least a century stand seemed inevitable, even when Sri Lanka’s three main bowlers delivered tight spells in the early part of their partnership, making them spend 128 balls for their first 40 runs. Vijay and Pujara had to work extremely hard for runs in that period, but they knew how to deal with that sort of situation, having done it many times in the past.Herath was particularly tricky to handle. With small changes in his release points and wrist position, he teased Vijay, bowling largely undercutters that skidded on towards the stumps, but occasionally flighting one with overspin. He kept flirting with Vijay’s inside edge, as he pushed at a few balls, not quite certain about where they would land or which way they would go; early on, most just kept going with the arm.Herath nearly got a wicket with one of these, when Vijay tried to step out and knock him off his length, but failed to reach the pitch of the ball and flicked in the air. It went off the inside half of the bat towards short leg. It didn’t stick.Then, in his fifth over, Herath got one to rip past Vijay’s outside edge and followed up with a slider that, from the same spot on the pitch, sneaked in and hit the inside edge. It was a difficult period, but Vijay and Pujara knew it wouldn’t last.”That’s Test cricket and you have got to respect it,” Vijay said. “I think that’s how innings have got to be built. The easy way is being more aggressive and take high percentage of risks, but they were bowling well and so we thought that we can buy time now and maybe cash in latter half of the day.”The cashing in happened in spurts, whenever Sri Lanka brought on their fourth and fifth bowlers. Dasun Shanaka picked up five wickets in green, overcast Kolkata, but take away those conditions and his medium-pace becomes far less of a threat. Dilruwan Perera has five five-wicket hauls in Test cricket, but also an economy rate above three an over, which puts him in a strange bracket – he’s a better bowler than, say, Roston Chase, who bowls a lot of overs but is clearly a batsman first, but he isn’t quite a proper frontline spinner.On this day, their shortcomings became quickly apparent.M Vijay defends on the front foot•BCCIVijay drove Shanaka for two fours in his first over of the match, sending him out of the attack, temporarily. Dilruwan replaced him, and Vijay greeted him with a boundary through the covers. A cagey morning quickly gave way to Indian dominance. Between Shanaka’s introduction and lunch, they scored 50 in 13 overs. Vijay went from 26 off 86 balls to 56 off 129.The second session was all about damage control from Sri Lanka and yet their defensive fields seemed powerless to stop Pujara and, in particular, Vijay, who reminded Indian fans of the many shades that exist in his batting between the two poles he’s most often identified with – IPL dasher and Test-match blocker and leaver.He reminded them of his wrists, which he employed to drill a good ball – good length, fourth-stump line – down the ground, between Lahiru Gamage and Pujara. He reminded them of his hands, deft hands that opened his bat face ever so slightly to glide a wide one from Suranga Lakmal between backward point and cover point, the resultant three runs bringing up the century stand. A few overs later, he picked up two with a similar shot to the right of third man, and followed up with a late chop to the same fielder’s left.He reminded fans of the arrogant streak that can still surface, from time to time, in his batting. ” are bowling at ?” That’s what he seemed to tell Dilruwan, repeatedly. There was a reverse-sweep for four, off the top-edge, from wide outside leg stump; another, off the sweet spot, from middle stump; and forays out of his crease and deep into it for drives and whips to all parts.More than that, though, the disdain for Dilruwan was evident in how easily Vijay knocked him around for singles. As Vijay’s century neared, he bowled round the wicket to him, with five fielders on the leg side: three on the boundary, and two short midwickets. Three times in a row, Pujara and Vijay worked him into the deep for ones, between and either side of the two short midwickets. Then Perera bowled two dots with Vijay on 95.Next ball, Vijay slid noiselessly away from leg stump and pushed a leg-stump ball to mid-off, inside-out. The fielder was neither deep enough to save four nor close enough to save one. Vijay almost ambled the single. He would play the same shot to move from 98 to 99, and then from 99 to 100. He was toying with Sri Lanka.Vijay had scored 102 off his last 135 balls when he played that final, fatal sweep off Herath. At that tempo, with the bowlers and fielders at his mercy, a double-hundred might have felt deliciously achievable. It wasn’t to be, but it was just another reminder to his fans of the batsman they have known and loved and waited eight months to watch.

Over the years, there has been a noticeable gulf between how Maxwell sees himself and where he should improve versus the way the Australian team views him. That gulf appears to be narrowing, finally

Daniel Brettig08-Feb-2018Before “train smarter”, before “are you going to pick a bloke who hasn’t made a hundred in two years?”, before the “leadership group” sanction for asking why he was batting below Matthew Wade in the Victoria batting order, Glenn Maxwell’s first public dressing down by the Darren Lehmann-era team hierarchy took place in the Adelaide Airport arrivals hall, a little more than four years ago.Chasing 317 to beat a pre-Peter Moores England, Australia were reasonably placed at 5 for 222 in Perth with Maxwell in the company of Daniel Christian, needing 95 off the final 66 balls. To that very delivery, the first of a new spell from Ben Stokes, Maxwell swung wildly at a change of pace and managed only a thin edge through to Jos Buttler, the first of five wickets to go down for 37 and hand England their first victory of the tour. A few days after a similarly inattentive dismissal had left James Faulkner to conjure his Brisbane miracle in the company of Clint McKay, this was enough to set off Lehmann the following day.”It got down to 95 off 11 or 12 [overs] and in this day and age you should get those,” Lehmann said. ”Disappointing to lose 5 for 50 or whatever it was and fall short. So our blokes – and Maxwell – he’s got to understand, we’ve got to play better cricket.’ He understands he has got to be a better cricketer for us to get to where we want to get to.”He’s got the talent, but the way we want him to play, he’s got to finish those games off for us. He’s a great young kid and the thing is he realised his mistake from last night and he owned up to that. He’s got to get better. He’s batting in the top six so he is a batting all-rounder so he’s got to show the responsibility to bat like that at six. We know he’s got flair and excitement and we love that about him but we want him to understand the game better.”Next to some of the more recent rebukes, this was as much carrot as stick (“we love that about him”), but the underlying message was clear. Lehmann and others did not believe Maxwell understood the game and how to play it, beyond sizing up his next big shot. It is a contention that has lingered ever since, through the 2015 World Cup, last year’s failed Champions Trophy campaign, and a summer in which Maxwell has spent far more time on the sidelines than in the middle for Australia.For much of this period, there has been a noticeable gulf in how Maxwell sees himself and where he should improve, versus the way the Australian team views the 29-year-old. Pointedly, in mid-2016 he observed that “I don’t think I can rest on just being a batsman. I know Steven Smith went that way when he lost his Test spot, not really bowling much at all. But I don’t think I can go that direction. I have to keep working on both parts of my game and make sure they’re good enough.”What followed over much of the past 18 months was telling – whenever Maxwell did play for Australia, he barely bowled, and as captain Smith generally preferred to use the part-time spin of Travis Head when both men were in the side. Meanwhile, Maxwell’s continued inconsistency as a batsman, with the exception of his outstanding Test century in Ranchi during last year’s epic series against India, allowed Smith, Lehmann and the selectors to continue thinking this outrageous talent was not listening to their years-old message about the need to “understand the game better”.One of the fascinating things about the gap between Maxwell and the team hierarchy was that it has remained despite the Victorian making several efforts to improve himself as a player, however ham-fisted. First, there was collusion by Maxwell and New South Wales to have him move states in 2016 during a limited-overs tour of Sri Lanka. This accounted for everything except for the fact that Victoria had no intention of letting him move – and effectively blocked it by correctly pointing out that the window for Cricket Australia contracted players moving states had well and truly lapsed.The fact that this appeared to have been done with the blessing of Smith and Lehmann as a way of helping Maxwell develop his game was forgotten when Maxwell then found himself understandably on the outer with the Bushrangers. A new state coach in Andrew McDonald dropped him from the start of the Sheffield Shield season, before Maxwell was sentenced to batting-order penance below Wade that caused him to describe the situation as “painful” and then be criticised by Smith and fined by a leadership group of Smith, David Warner, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood that had never been heard of before or since.Following that misadventure, and aided by some advice about perceptions from the Melbourne Stars coach Stephen Fleming, Maxwell then made the effort to knuckle down at training. For the first time in some years, he spent time concentrating on longer-form batting technique and consistency, more so than the crazy, brave and inventive shots that had him dubbed “The Big Show” as far back as his first international tour in the UAE in 2012.The fruits of this work were writ large across the Ranchi innings, but Maxwell was unable to sustain that standard through the Champions Trophy, the tour of Bangladesh, and the limited-overs trip to India, finding himself out of the side as a result. Nevertheless, he had made peace in Victoria and was rewarded by a top-four batting commission he used to great effect in early-season Shield fixtures.In this, Maxwell made for an intriguing contrast with another player of considerable Twenty20 flash – Chris Lynn. Where Lynn has made no secret of abandoning longer-form cricket in favour of T20, despite still being seen as a key part of Australia’s ODI regeneration, Maxwell has remained very much committed to playing all forms with their competing priorities of technical, mental and scheduling natures. The keenness of the selectors to use Lynn, irrespective of numerous physical ailments and strictly limited appearances for his state, has underlined that there has been more than performance to the decisions around Maxwell.Necessity, of course, brings changes in attitude, and this summer it has been the Australian team’s turn to adapt. Horrid Australian batting displays in the ODI series against England meant that Maxwell ended the series as part of the set-up where he had begun it on the outer – there was even a detente-ish coffee with Smith in Melbourne – even after he had returned the favours of Lehmann and others by publicly critiquing the way the Australians were handling the middle overs “chill” time with the bat. Smith’s “train smarter” suggestion has been clarified to Maxwell’s satisfaction.”The thing with those comments, he was talking about one-day cricket, and they were probably justified,” Maxwell said. “I think as a No. 6 it’s an awkward thing to prepare for because you go in with about 15 or 16 different scenarios. If your team’s 4 for 50 you’ve got to make sure you’re knuckling down and batting a long period of time. If you’re 4 for 250 with five overs left you’ve got to go from ball one. That was more what he was talking about. We had a good conversation about that. He wasn’t talking about my Sheffield Shield preparation, or my BBL preparation, he was talking about my ODI preparation, and I’ve only had one ODI since then!”

Where Chris Lynn has made no secret of abandoning longer-form cricket in favour of T20, Maxwell has remained very much committed to playing all forms with their competing priorities of technical, mental and scheduling natures. The keenness of the selectors to use Lynn, irrespective of numerous physical ailments and limited appearances for his state, has underlined that there has been more than performance to the decisions around Maxwell.

In the T20 series that has followed, where Australia have been led by Warner (with whom Maxwell happens to share a manager) rather than Smith and coached by Ricky Ponting in addition to Lehmann, a more effectively functioning unit has seen Maxwell performing at the sort of standard the team has long been looking for. Any previous gap between the hierarchy and the player appears to have closed to a far more manageable distance – both seem to agree on what they want out of each other. The presence of Ponting, as of the recent IPL auction Maxwell’s coach for Delhi Daredevils, is significant.”We’ve been doing a little bit of work off the field, even just with my preparation which has been pretty consistent over the last couple of games, and having little chats to him about the game,” Maxwell said. “I’ve made it pretty public he’s one of my childhood idols and to have him in my corner and backing me is awesome.”For Australia’s T20 selector Mark Waugh, this is a far more acceptable state of affairs as he seeks to aid the team in climbing up the ICC rankings. “No matter what sport you play or office you’re in, everyone’s got different personalities,” Waugh told . “It’s all about performance, that’s all I’m worried about as a selector, performance on the field, and if you’re performing on the field you’ll fit in around your teammates.”No-one’s perfect, we’ve all got different ways of approaching our games and off the field everyone’s different as well, that’s just part of the fabric of a team game, you’ve got to mould in and work together. Once you get out on that field, performance is all I’m worried about.”Maxwell, too, has shown a measure of humility about his earlier missteps, telling last month that he had been “naive” in earlier years. “I probably did waste my talent early on. I was probably a bit naive about what I could do and how successful I could be playing for Australia,” he said. “I know it probably frustrated a lot of people and I know it frustrated myself and my family. To be able to start putting some of that talent, which is probably one of the worst words, and potential, which is one of the other worst words, together into some runs this summer, [it’s been] probably 12-18 months of hard work.”After his match-winning century to guide the Australians home in Hobart on Wednesday night, Maxwell was eager to state he was more satisfied by starting when it was difficult – notably playing the swinging ball more effectively than Lynn – than finishing with three figures. “The way I worked after the start – 2 for 4 in the first over while the ball was swinging around a bit – to get through that was probably something people had doubted in my ability,” Maxwell said. “Being able to get through tough periods of bowling and they had the ball moving around.”To get through those first three or four overs where the ball was zipping around … I was able to hit a couple in the middle and once you do that you can get on a bit of a roll. Unfortunately as soon I got onto a bit of a roll, we’d lose a wicket and I’d have to start again. It was a bit of a stuttered innings in that regard but it was good to be able to get through and be not out at the end.”The positive thing for me with this summer is that when I’ve come back into the Australian team, I’ve been in good form leading into it. The pleasing thing for me this summer, it’s a been lot more consistent. I’ve been able to consistently get involved in the game and be influential in certain parts. That’s probably the biggest change from this summer/last summer where there were mixed results that didn’t warrant selections back into the side.”Best of all for Maxwell, the morning after was marked by praise rather than criticism, from both a teammate and a selector. Quoth Marcus Stoinis: “He is one of those players whose individual performance can win or change the whole game. I feel like he is getting some consistency and he is in a really good spot, so I’m expecting some big things from him.”Waugh, too, offered generous words, and as importantly stated that Australia saw Maxwell as a key part of their plans, not merely a bit-part player to be shuffled around depending on the whims of others. “As selectors we’ve been at Maxy about winning us games and that’s exactly what he did last night,” he said, “so from his point of view a great innings under pressure, he got wickets as well, so that’s the standard that he’s set himself and he’s quite capable of doing that on a regular basis, so moving forward that’s what we’re hoping for from Maxy.”Nonetheless, it all could have been different had Jason Roy been judged by the third umpire to have taken a clean catch at long-off when Maxwell and Australia were still 53 runs short of the target – something he was apt to make note of. “Sometimes you need a bit of luck,” Maxwell said, “and fortunately it was all on my side last night.” After all the aforementioned opprobrium from the national team for which he plays, Maxwell was perhaps due this measure of good fortune.

A rampaging opener, a tall and accurate offspinner, and the emergence of Under-19 talent highlighted the 2017-18 season of the tournament

Mohammad Isam06-Apr-2018The Dhaka Premier League is known as the breeding ground for Bangladesh cricket’s future. Here’s a look at five cricketers who stood out in the 2017-18 tournament.Nazmul Hossain ShantoNazmul’s fourth century of the season, in the tournament’s last game against Legends of Rupganj, was pivotal to Abahani Limited’s push for the title. A solid batsman, Nazmul added to his technical prowess by finding plenty of new shots through the season, finishing top of the charts with 749 runs. Nazmul also maintained a strike-rate of 97.52, better by far than each of the ten batsmen below him. Among batsmen with 500-plus runs, only Nurul Hasan scored quicker. However, after the Rupganj game, ODI captain Mashrafe Mortaza said that Nazmul needed a bit more time to get ready for international cricket.Nayeem HasanNayeem was fast-tracked into the Bangladesh Test squad in January this year, as one of three spinners to cover for the injured Shakib Al Hasan. He eventually sat out the Chittagong Test against Sri Lanka, and wasn’t picked again in the series, but Nayeem isn’t one to forget.A tall offspinner, which is a rarity in Bangladesh these days, Nayeem was accurate in landing the big off-breaks during the DPL. He took 23 wickets and gave away 4.7 runs an over, with a best of 4 for 53. Gazi Group coach Mohammad Salahuddin said that Nayeem showed his hard-working side immediately after exiting the Bangladesh dressing room. He’d now hope to play in the Bangladesh Cricket League’s remaining matches, which begin on April 10, to take his bowling further in a season that has earned him some recognition of his talent.Mahidul IslamMahidul Islam was the league’s highest run-scorer among wicketkeepers, with 609 runs at 40.60 in 16 matches. He also topped the dismissals column, with 28 victims. But ahead of the league, Mahidul was the little-known wicketkeeper who played for the underdog club Khelaghar Samaj Kallyan Samity. He had had a poor Under-19 World Cup campaign in New Zealand, where he made just 35 runs in three innings.Mahidul’s knocks of 85 and 115 not out against Gazi Group Cricketers and Agrani Bank respectively went a long way towards confirming Khelaghar’s place in next season’s DPL. He also scored three other fifties against Gazi Group and Rupganj, which meant that most of his big runs came against the big clubs.Mohammad NaimAnother Under-19 player who caught the eye in this season’s DPL after a lean U-19 World Cup in New Zealand, Naim was among the top ten run-scorers, with 556 runs from 12 innings, after not being an automatic choice for Rupganj. Naim became consistent after scores of 93 and 82 midway through the league, culminating with his rapid 70 against Abahani on the final day.Naim is a tall and upright opening batsman, who leans into his drives down the ground. He still needs to work against the short ball, but according to Rupganj coach Manjurul Islam, Naim has shown that he is ready to work hard to take it to the next level. Manjurul, however, thinks that Naim is still a fair distance away from knocking on the senior team’s door.Robiul HaqueRobiul was one of two young pace bowlers who were consistent in the DPL. He took 27 wickets at an average of 16.66, and gave away 4.47 runs per over. His only five-wicket haul came against Rupganj, while his three wickets against Abahani gave Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club a whiff of a maiden DPL title.Robiul impressed with his strong bowling action, but he has a long way to go in maintaining his fitness and taking his bowling to the next level. A call-up to the High Performance squad is, however, likely.

Batting collapses are no longer an aberration for England’s Test team, but on Thursday they were out-Englanded, done in by seam and swing and perhaps their own emphasis on short-form cricket

George Dobell at Lord's25-May-20181:09

A few things had crept into my game – Cook

Some things never change at Lord’s: there’s the slope, the grand old pavilion, the unique hum of the crowd and, just around the corner, another England batting collapse.This one was pretty special. Even by their standards. The first-innings total was their lowest here having won the toss since 1955. And in losing their last five wickets for 16 runs (and their last six for 35), they revived memories of … well, just about every game they play these days.It keeps happening, doesn’t it? England keep getting bowled out cheaply and leaving their bowlers under pressure. The opening partnership is now, statistically speaking, the worst in England’s Test history (of pairs to have batted together a minimum of 10 times) and, after totals of 58 at Auckland, 180 in Sydney, 227 in Adelaide, 195 in Brisbane, 198 and 133 in Nottingham, 158 in Vizag and 101 in Centurion – to name but a few of many – we can hardly dismiss such a score as an aberration. And, these days, there’s no Moeen Ali – or even Chris Woakes – to bail them out.They will remain fragile, too, until they start giving Test cricket the respect it deserves. Sure, the ECB say all the right things about it being their top priority. And sure, everyone involved is keen to do well. But all the evidence – the scheduling, selection, the language – suggests otherwise. All that evidence suggests the white-ball game (and we presume The 100 is to be played with a white ball rather than a rainbow-
coloured decahedron) – offering more money and the chance to ‘engage’ a new audience, as it does – is the priority. That’s not necessarily a bad strategy, but let us not talk falsely and pretend that first-class cricket in England hasn’t been compromised in the race for a few dollars more.So, while we ask players to come into Tests without having played red-ball cricket for many months – Jos Buttler, for example, hasn’t played a first-class game since September and Ben Stokes hasn’t played one since returning from the IPL – and while others are expected to find their form on early-season pitches unsuited to grooming top-quality professionals, days like this will keep happening.But you know that already. We all know that already. It requires to actually act on that knowledge for anything to change.Let’s also give some credit to the Pakistan bowlers. They performed with skill and nous in harnessing the conditions expertly. It remains one of the wonders of cricket that, even shorn of their leading spinner and the chance to play much cricket in their home country, they keep producing fine cricketers who show up England – with their facilities, their salaries, their hubris – for the mediocre Test side they have become.The delivery that bowled Mark Stoneman, for example, (from the skilful Mohammad Abbas) moved up the slope to hit his off stump. Similarly, the ball (from the admirably persistent Faheem Ashraf) that bowled Jonny Bairstow held its line just enough to defeat his somewhat loose drive and take his off stump. And the ball that ended Alastair Cook’s fine innings was another that held its line just enough to defeat the outside edge. All three were victims of terrific bowling.Batting was not easy, either. History may well remember Joe Root’s decision to win the toss as a bit of a stinker – the pitch was green, conditions were overcast and Pakistan admitted they would have bowled first, anyway – but it may not have been quite as bad as it currently seems. His logic was that, after a tough couple of hours, conditions would ease and, with the pitch surprisingly dry under the covering of live grass, it may result in deliveries keeping low as the match progresses into a fourth or fifth day.Whether the match lasts that long remains to be seen. While Cook was keen not to throw his captain under the bus after play, he did admit there was “nip and swing” to deal with. He also reasoned that England were perhaps only 90 or 100 runs short of par and referenced a recent match, on a similar pitch, when he played for Essex against Worcestershire.Getty ImagesEngland are not completely out of this game yet. Pakistan’s batting is brittle, too.But these were classic English conditions. Conditions which most of these players should be familiar with and comfortable in. And conditions which Pakistan have come into and harnessed, to out-England England. It would be like England spinning Pakistan to defeat in the UAE or Lahore.Batsmen will receive good deliveries at the Test level, though. They have to be able to deal with them better than this. The ball that dismissed Dawid Malan, for example, was in a really good area – probing just outside off stump – but it moved little, if at all, and top-order batsmen have to find ways to negate such threats. Stoneman, too, might reflect that the delivery that dismissed him was the third that over to have left him up the slope. It should not have been quite the shock it seems to have been. Joe Root, tied down for 45 minutes in scoring just four, launched himself at a wide one too short for a drive and nicked to the keeper. “We’ve all played a bad shot,” as Cook put it. “He’s still a world-class player.”But perhaps it was the wicket of Buttler that best summed up England’s innings. There was a time when a specialist batsman might have been encouraged to leave the delivery outside off stump in conditions where the ball is swinging and when the team is in trouble.Not any more. The game has changed, we’re told. England have encouraged Buttler to “be positive” and, having accepted he doesn’t have much of a defence, feel that attack is his best method to deal with just about every circumstance. On his day and on true surfaces, it will come off and be spectacular. But there’s a reason why just about every successful Test batsman in history has had to possess a decent defence: and that reason is that, on days like this, it is the only percentage way to play. England’s thinking is too clever by half. The game hasn’t changed that much.Cook, at least, showed his side the way. The man who laid the platform for their win in India in 2012-13 and their win in Australia in 2010-11. The man who has scored more Test runs for this side than anyone in history, who equalled the record for the longest run of consecutive Tests in history. He’ll break it next week, too.He needed this innings. He had reached 40 only once in his 17 most recent Test innings and, in a richer playing age, would be far more uncomfortable in this side.But it is odd that it is Cook – with his record – who is the one that seems out of fashion. It is odd that it is Cook, with his patience and discipline, who seems out of step with modernity. Quite a few of his colleagues could learn plenty from his mindset and method.England may get away with it this week. But they need to confront the fact that their batting is flimsy and has been for some time. They’re doing something – whether it’s the coaching, or schedule, or approach – wrong.Pakistan were good, but are not the only team who have made England look mediocre. India did it. New Zealand did it. Bangladesh did it. And Australia did it brutally. And while there might, on occasions, have been some excuses – England have historically struggled with spin and pace and bounce – here they were undone by swing and seam. Conditions in which they are meant to excel. If they start to struggle at home, there really isn’t anywhere left to hide.

As T20 cricket continues to evolve, scoring rates are higher than ever before, and the 2018 Vitality Blast is no different

Gaurav Sundararaman20-Aug-2018Over the last couple of years, the T20 format has been undergoing its next revolution, with more runs, more sixes, and more hundreds. The run rates in IPL 2017 (8.41) and 2018 (8.64) were the highest in the tournament’s history while the ongoing CPL has been a run-fest as well. The Vitality Blast this season has also been at the forefront of this change. At the end of the league stage, this year’s tournament has witnessed an overall run rate of 8.88, which is not only the best scoring rate in the history of the competition but also in the history of any T20 league that has taken place.ESPNcricinfo LtdEngland’s flat pitches and small grounds have made it a lot easier for the batsmen. This year’s edition has witnessed 1392 sixes – 11.6 sixes per game, which is the most in the history of the league. Fifteen centuries have been scored – the second-highest since the league started – with seven matches left. There have been three centuries in this year’s edition that are among the 20 fastest centuries in all T20s. Northamptonshire have been at the receiving end of two such scores – Daniel Christian walked into bat at 9.4 overs and scored 113 runs from just 40 balls , while Martin Guptill scored 102 runs from 38 balls to help Worcestershire chase down 187 in just 13.1 overs. However, it wasn’t all doom and gloom for Northamptonshire, as they managed to end their streak of 13 matches without a victory, the longest such streak in the Blast.In last year’s tournament, there were 27 scores in excess of 200 – a record at the time – but 2018 has already witnessed 31 such scores at the end of the league phase. Teams have also realized the need to maximise their returns from the Powerplay overs: 12 of the top 13 highest Powerplay scores in the tournament have come in the last two editions, with ten instances of teams scoring in excess of 90 in the first six overs. The average Powerplay run-rate of 8.87 is the best across all T20 leagues.Smart Stats Earlier this year, ESPNcricinfo launched Smart Stats to measure a player’s performance in T20s based on match context and situation. Here is what those numbers say about the top performers in the Blast this season.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe top batsmen at the BlastAaron Finch has been in great form in the T20 format since his poor IPL campaign. Finch tops the run charts in this year’s Blast scoring 589 runs from nine innings at an average of 147.25 and a strike rate of 182.35. Not surprisingly, Finch is among the top names in the Smart Stats batting metrics as well. His 589 runs have come off only 323 balls. When match strike rate and runs scored at the other end are considered, his Smart Strike Rate goes up to 214.96, which means he has contributed 105.32 extra runs in the balls he has faced. This Smart Contribution is the highest among all batsmen this season; Colin Ingram is not too far behind with a Smart Contribution of 101.08. Incidentally, both Finch and Ingram won’t play any further part in the tournament, as their teams have failed to qualify for the quarter-finals. Daniel Christian, Corey Anderson and Philip Salt complete the top five with Smart Contributions of 86.68, 78.23 and 75.72. The teams they represent have qualified for the playoffs. From this top-five list, Finch is the only one who is also among the top five run-getters in the tournament.Wrist spinners continue to dominate the formatWristspinners have ruled the T20 format recently, and the Blast has not disappointed in that regard. The top five wicket-takers among spinners are legbreak bowlers, and three of the top five bowlers with the best Smart Economy Rates are wristspinners. The encouraging sign for England is that the top two wicket-takers are domestic recruits Matt Parkinson and Joe Denly, while the other three are seasoned overseas T20 bowlers in Ish Sodhi, Rashid Khan and Imran Tahir. Wristspinners struck once every 18 balls and conceded a rate of 7.77 while fingerspinners struck once every 24 balls and conceded 8.36 runs per over.

Bowler Type Econ Wkt Ave SRWrist Spin 7.77 171 23.45 18.1Finger spin 8.36 205 33.96 24.36ESPNcricinfo LtdKent Spitfires were involved in seven matches that had scores in excess of 200, while their home venue has one of the worst economy rates this season, with bowlers going at 9.75. In such a venue, Adam Milne’s economy rate of 7.05 stands out. Taking into account the match economy rate and the specific overs that he has bowled, Milne’s Smart Economy Rate (SER) of 4.85 is the best in the tournament so far. The fact that he has bowled the difficult overs in the Powerplay and the Death speaks volume of his skills.In simple terms, taking into account the context of each match he has played so far, Milne has saved his team 83 runs in the overs he has bowled. Three legspinners in Max Waller from Somerset (SER 4.9), Imran Tahir (SER 5.16) and Rashid Khan (SER 5.37) occupy the next three positions in the Smart Economy Rate index. Milne’s New Zealand colleague, Lockie Fergusson, has also had a good season going at a SER of 5.43 and saving 58 runs for his team.

His astute decision-making helped India restrict Pakistan to a manageable total

Shashank Kishore in Dubai23-Sep-2018It’s one thing to expect your fast bowlers to be disciplined, another to set fields and challenge the batsmen to take risks. This is what Rohit Sharma did superbly as captain on Sunday, as India arrested Pakistan’s late surge and then chased down 238 in a canter to make it four wins on the trot in the Asia Cup. After Bangladesh held their nerve against Afghanistan, India were confirmed as the first finalist. ESPNcricinfo examines a few of Rohit’s tactics that hurt Pakistan on Sunday.Keeping Fakhar Zaman quietFakhar Zaman is Pakistan’s enforcer at the top, a factor coach Mickey Arthur has underlined as the key to their ODI success. Earlier this year in Zimbabwe, Fakhar became the first ODI double-centurion from Pakistan and has formed a formidable opening combination with Imam-ul-Haq.So when Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah kept cutting off Fakhar’s scoring areas by bowling stump-to-stump on a length, denying him room to pull and play flat-batted strokes, Rohit deliberately kept mid-on a touch wide and left midwicket open. Since the angle from right-arm over the wicket takes the ball away, he was trying to play on Fakhar’s ego by forcing him to hit into the vacant region on the leg side. As it turned out, Fakhar stopped short of playing the pull and had limped to 6 off 24 balls at the end of seven overs.Introducing spin earlyRohit isn’t one for making changes unnecessarily. Not bowling Kedar Jadhav against Bangladesh despite him having picked career-best 3 for 23 against Pakistan when the sides last met was a prime example. But when Fakhar and Imam were struggling to force the pace, he sprang up a surprise by introducing Yuzvendra Chahal in the eighth over.It was left-field because Chahal had only bowled four Powerplay overs in ODIs prior to Sunday. Two days ago against Bangladesh, he was introduced in the ninth over. Here, he struck off his sixth delivery as Imam was given out lbw upon review after he was beaten by sharp turn trying to work the ball with the spin. It was Chahal’s first Powerplay wicket in ODIs.Forcing Sarfraz-Malik to deviate from set templateIn the previous game between the two sides, Babar Azam misread a Kuldeep Yadav googly that dipped and spun away to castle him. If bringing Kuldeep on in the 11th over was more to get on the batsman’s nerves, it was a ploy well thought out.With the left-right combination in place, Rohit operated spin in tandem. The stand-out move was having a backward short leg for Fakhar, who struggled against sharp turn. With no fine leg for protection, there were runs to be had if he could paddle the ball fine. Fakhar tried this against Chahal and was almost beaten by the bounce and got a top-edge that just eluded Dinesh Karthik and rolled to fine leg.The spin choke was on, and because the fast bowlers had built so much pressure, Fakhar was forced to look for a release against spin. Fifty-six balls hadn’t yielded a boundary. Drying up boundaries meant pressure and he fell after he was thrown off balance trying to slog-sweep an overpitched Kuldeep delivery. Then when Shoaib Malik and Sarfraz came together in the 16th over, Rohit immediately brought back Bumrah instead of letting the game drift. Malik’s average of 45.01 against spin is significantly higher as compared to his 34.78 against pace. His strength lies in manipulating the field and playing percentage cricket before exploding in the end overs. By not feeding his strengths, Rohit forced Malik to alter his plans immediately.No chopping and changingRohit bats for continuity, having been in and out of the Test squad himself. At the arrival press conference in the UAE, he made it clear experimentation for middle order spots wouldn’t come at the cost of continuity and results. Ambati Rayudu and Dinesh Karthik have been the biggest beneficiaries of this policy at the Asia Cup. Batting at Nos. 3 and 4 respectively, the pair have made the most of the whatever little batting time they have had. The flip side to the ploy has been time on the bench for KL Rahul.Another noteworthy aspect has been Rohit’s ability to separate captaincy and batting. It has helped, of course, that barring the Hong Kong game, India haven’t really been challenged. When they last played Pakistan, Rohit played out a testing opening spell, before he decided to hook Usman Khan out of the attack by hitting him behind square for three sixes. That he’s coming off a two-month break – he wasn’t picked for the England Tests – has also allowed him to remain mentally fresh for the rigours of playing in the UAE heat. After four games, he has scores of 111*, 83*, 52 and 23.

The success of England’s new recruits in recent months can be attributed in part to the groundwork laid by the ECB’s Mo Bobat

Jon Culley13-Nov-2018It is probably fair to say that even among the more well-informed England cricket fans, the name of Mo Bobat might not be particularly familiar.Yet the 36-year-old former PE teacher from Leicester has become such an important member of the behind-the-scenes team at the ECB that whenever England selectors Ed Smith and James Taylor sit down with head coach Trevor Bayliss to weigh up the shape of the next Test or ODI squad, Bobat will be in the room with them.As the ECB’s Player Identification Lead, Bobat is there to provide Smith and company with data and information on any player they might wish to discuss at a level of detail – and compiled at a level of rigour – that their predecessors in that crucial role could only dream about.”I have to stress that I’m not there as a decision-maker,” Bobat said. “That is their role. Mine is to provide information, whether from scouting reports, performance analysis or whatever, to check and challenge in terms of the selection process to ensure it is robust, and to share insight, if the selectors request it, around the options that might be suggested by our player pathway system.”It has all come about as a result of a revolution in the England selection system in which Bobat has been a key figure, having been appointed to his current job in 2016 after Andrew Strauss, in his role of director of England cricket, had identified selection as an area that needed a complete overhaul – although the first seeds of this revolution had been planted soon after Bobat joined the ECB.A sports science and management graduate who was a teacher for seven years but who had experience of cricket as an age-group coach at Leicestershire, Bobat started work at the National Cricket Performance Centre on the university campus at Loughborough in 2011.”Although I started with the under-17s, much of my time with the ECB has been with the under-19 programme and the genesis of where we are now with player ID, much of it came from what we did at that level,” he said.”We were quite fortunate that Ed Barney, who is now the performance director at UK Hockey, was studying at Loughborough for a PhD in talent identification and what he was doing prompted a lot of thought and consideration.”Debutant Ben Foakes was handed his Test cap by Bruce French•Getty ImagesWith the encouragement of Simon Timson, now performance director of the Lawn Tennis Association and then head of the England development programme, Bobat took some of Barney’s research and ideas and looked at ways in which he could apply them to cricket.”We did some work around our Under-19 programme in terms of how we identify and select players and we made some enhancements and formalised a few things and I guess that had a bit of an impact,” he said.”In 2016 Straussy and David Parsons [ECB performance director] asked me to extend some of that thinking over to how we recruit players for the Lions programme, and in the winter of 2017 Straussy said he would like me to extend this to the senior England team.”Bobat’s work has only emphasised that the manner in which England teams were picked in the past belongs to the dark ages in sporting terms.Whereas selection came with a large element of randomness, dependent on which selector had been where or spoken to whom, and in which some players got lucky and others did not in finding their best form at the right moment, nothing now is left to chance.A comprehensive network of county informants has been put in place and ECB scouts are assigned to watch players several times over – “multiple eyes, multiple times” is something of a mantra – in order to file tailored reports designed to answer key questions. Once players are in the England system, detailed information on every performance is added to the database, with that information in particular helping the selectors decide who needs to be tested in which environment.Bobat believes it is no coincidence, for example, that Ben Foakes made such a successful England debut in Galle, in what is traditionally a difficult venue, having already played in Sri Lanka several times for the Under-19s and the Lions.

I’m not there as a decision-maker. My role is to provide information and insight

Underpinning the whole process is a carefully designed set of principles, setting out clearly defined goals and a process for achieving them, which Bobat drew up based on his research, including an ongoing study of the methods employed by other sports both at home and abroad – the England football team and Premier League clubs, Olympic sports, and particularly sports in the United States – seeking to add their best ideas to his own.”You try to beg and borrow from a number of environments,” he said. “In the States, for example, they are really smart with their analytics and they have a formalised process because they’ve been doing this in a more professional way for longer.”At Chelsea I was impressed with the level of time they spent training their scouts, all of whom have their own personal development plan and go through an appraisals process, while a club like Manchester City has got some really sophisticated performance analytics and predictive metrics, and Arsenal have done a lot of work around depth analysis and shadow teams.”What we are doing in cricket, particularly in this country, is still quite embryonic if you compare us to sports like football, but there are areas of our decision-making and thinking that I think are well ahead of some of those environments.”I think we have a real opportunity in England cricket, in terms of having someone fulfilling this role around talent ID and player identification, although I must emphasise that although I’ve led the direction of this, without the scouts we would not have the information, without the analysts there would be no data.”But there are not many equivalents across the world and there is a real opportunity for us here to get the march on a few other countries and I think we are starting to do that in a few areas.”The proof of the effectiveness of all this will be results, of course. Next year’s World Cup and home Ashes series are currently at the top of the clear priorities required in Bobat’s guiding principles – but winning away from home is another in that category, so England’s victory in the first Test in Galle – their first away from home in 14 Tests – can only be seen as encouraging.

With the new ball, the pacer has recorded the best economy rate, and smart economy, among all bowlers so far this season

Annesha Ghosh in Mumbai02-Apr-2019If you were to list Chennai Super Kings’ standout performers so far in IPL 2019, chances are you will point out the obvious names: MS Dhoni, Harbhajan Singh, Shane Watson, Dwayne Bravo and, to some extent, Imran Tahir.But Deepak Chahar’s contribution to Super Kings’ three wins in three games this season has been immense. It is, however, possible that in the afterglow of the end-overs brilliance of the Dhonis and the Bravos, Chahar’s feats haven’t registered quite as strongly as they might have otherwise.It has to do with how Dhoni uses Chahar, as a frontline bowler who doesn’t bowl in the death. With the field restrictions in play, he has bowled unbroken spells up front in all three matches. The result? Chahar has returned the best economy rate – 4.66 – and smart economy figures – 2.1 – so far this season.Most balls bowled by any bowler in IPL 2018•ESPNcricinfo LtdChahar holds the distinction of sending down the most deliveries in the first six overs since the start of the 2018 season – in which he took 10 wickets in 12 matches. He impressed with his ability to swing the ball under lights, which subsequently earned him the India cap – he has played one ODI and one T20I to date.Interestingly, while he is a better strike force, while also maintaining an excellent economy rate, in the first six overs, his economy actually becomes even better between overs seven and 11. But that’s not his best period in terms of picking up wickets.Where MS Dhoni bowls Deepak Chahar•ESPNcricinfo LtdOn the subject of wickets, Chahar didn’t have any while conceding 17 runs in Super Kings’ season opener against Royal Challengers Bangalore. In the last two matches, though, he struck thrice at the expense of only 39 runs his eight overs. His victims: Ajinkya Rahane, and the in-form pair of Sanju Samson and Prithvi Shaw. Impressive, right?For Stephen Fleming, the Super Kings head coach, the “relatively unsung” Chahar’s formidable showings this season haven’t come as a surprise. Fleming had, after all, observed the pace bowler from close quarters in the 2016 and 2017 seasons when they were both part of Rising Pune Supergiant, and he knew what the paceman can and cannot do.”He’s been with me for four years now and his development has been excellent,” Fleming said in Mumbai on Tuesday, ahead of Super Kings’ match against Mumbai Indians. “He’s always been a very skilful player, but in some ways, has been reducing his skills down to know what to deliver at the right time.

He’s worked around just being quite simple with his method rather than all this and all that and all the skills that he’s gotCoach Fleming on Chahar

“In particular, his bowling has been very good [this season]. [He] swung a little bit in the last game. He’s relatively unsung, but his performance to date has been very good. The key thing for him has been consistency.”Clarity of thought and a willingness to exercise restraint, stressed Fleming, have abetted Chahar’s evolution as a potent force in the IPL, and his determination to stick to the plan outlined for him by the support staff has made a big difference.Fleming said, “The bowling coaches, with Eric Simons (bowling consultant) and [Lakshmipathy] Balaji (bowling coach), he’s worked around just being quite simple with his method rather than all this and all that and all the skills that he’s got. He’s now a lot smarter with the options he uses.”Apart from his impressive run with the ball, there is also his less-analysed (and -utilised) skills with the bat in hand.In last season’s final league-stage fixture – yes, one more cricket match that ended with a Dhoni six! – a big blow to Kings XI Punjab’s playoff hopes came from an unlikely quarter: sent in at No. 6, ahead of Dhoni, Chahar smashed three sixes on his way to a 20-ball 39 that ensured his side ended on a high.The rationale behind promoting Chahar (and Harbhajan Singh) in that game, as the captain had explained, was to create “a bit of chaos” and negate the swing on offer for the bowling side.”If you see the bowling line-up, it was swinging a bit. In a game like this, you want to take a lot of wickets while it is swinging. So with Bhajji and Chahar going in – it creates a bit of chaos,” Dhoni said at the time. “With proper batsmen the bowlers are consistent; somehow to lower-order players they try the bouncers, off-cutters, etc.”But that may well have been a one-off exercise.”I want Deepak to fly under the radar… He’s been consistent with the ball,” Fleming said. “Look, I don’t want to see him with the bat. I don’t see him come out as a pinch-hitter again. But him at No. 8 is a talent not many have seen but he’s a very good player.”As long as can do his job with the ball, like he has been, it should stand both the player and his team in good stead.