Action replay: Sunil sizzles, Ojha fizzles
An undercooked Sunil Narine did all right in his first game in competitive cricket in about three months.
It was a tale of two spinners, both with remodelled action. An undercooked Sunil Narine did all right in his first game in competitive cricket in about three months. Ojha, who came to the IPL opener with a good many domestic matches under his belt, was all over the place. (Full Coverage| Fixtures)
Narine was reported for suspect action ahead of the Champions League T20 final in October last year. He corrected his action, got clearance from ICC-accredited Loughborough centre, was put through a retest at Sri Ramachandra University in Chennai and finally given the go-ahead to play this IPL. Uncertainty still loomed over his effectiveness and this match against Mumbai Indians was an examination.
Kolkata Knight Riders captain Gautam Gambhir brought on his premier spinner after powerplay. 37 for three was a nice platform for a bowler under pressure to regain his confidence. Narine was iffy to start with. A full-toss outside off stump was on offer and Rohit Sharma dispatched it to the cover boundary. Narine came back well to concede only one more run in that over.
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He bowled another boundary ball in his next over. Still, 2-011-0 in his first spell was more than acceptable in this format. It became 4-0-28-0 at the end — not the Narine of his earlier vintage but decent. He was mesmerising last season with 21 wickets in 16 matches at an economy rate of 6.35. But given the turmoil he had gone through over the last seven-odd months, it was satisfactory.
There were a couple of noticeable changes in his bowling. He was slower through the air and didn’t bowl a doosra. He replaced it with a finger spun leg-break instead. He deceived Rohit with one of them but Robin Uthappa couldn’t hold on to the edge behind the stumps.
On to Ojha now, who has also undergone action correction. The first game of IPL 8 didn’t go well for the Mumbai Indian left-arm spinner. He, too, came after the power-play overs, pitched short to start with to allow a couple to Gambhir and then was treated with contempt for a six over deep mid-wicket.
Ojha lost his confidence and started to bowl flat. Gambhir and Manish Pandey continued to plunder runs. Ojha gave away 23 runs in his first two overs and was never called to action again. There was very little variation in his bowling which should be a cause for concern for the Mumbai team management.
Source:: Indian Express
