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His transformation has been remarkable, and he has earned his place as India’s premier white-ball wristspinner

Abhimanyu Bose26-Sep-20233:00

How Kuldeep Yadav has fared since the 2019 World Cup

If, at the start of 2022, you were asked which wristspinner among Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav was going to be picked for the ODI World Cup the following year, you would not be blamed for choosing the former. In fact, that would be the sound, educated guess.After all, from the end of the 2019 World Cup to the end of 2021, Chahal had picked 34 wickets in 21 ODIs at an average of 28.47. Kuldeep, in that same period, played a game more, got just 26 wickets, and averaged 43.73.Nothing seemed to be going right for Kuldeep around then – he was even relegated to the bench by his then IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders.But then, something changed.Related

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It’s not like Chahal did a lot wrong. He picked up 24 wickets in 16 ODIs between the start of 2022 to now, and his average improved marginally to 27.91. Even his economy rate dropped from 5.70 to 5.53.But Kuldeep’s transformation was massive.Suddenly, he was bowling quicker, but still getting the turn that troubled batters when he first burst on to the scene. His variations were still as effective, if not more, and now came with more zip off the surface.The results followed.From the start of 2022, Kuldeep has picked up 43 wickets in 24 matches and his bowling average has shot down to 18.93 (in this period). His economy rate, which was 5.76 between the end of the 2019 World Cup and the end of 2021, dropped to 4.70. He has picked up three-wicket hauls against Australia and New Zealand and four-fors against South Africa and Sri Lanka. And then, of course, there was the 5 for 25 against Pakistan in the Asia Cup Super Four game.Kuldeep Yadav has been a transformed bowler since the start of 2022•ESPNcricinfo LtdA criticism Kuldeep often faced when his career seemed to be all downhill was that he was bowling too slow. Despite the prodigious turn he would generate.But the solution wasn’t simple, because Kuldeep had to get quicker without losing the trajectory that so deceived the batters, and turn that made him so good in the first place.A knee injury, suffered during IPL 2021, turned out to be the point the transformation started. The surgery that followed offered him a chance to start over, in a sense. As he completed a five-month recovery and got back to bowling, he tweaked his run-up from what was almost a 45-degree angle to a much straighter approach. That was change number one.”It’s been over one-and-a-half years since I had surgery,” Kuldeep said after his heroics against Pakistan at the Asia Cup. “The run-up has become straighter. The rhythm has become aggressive. The approach is nice.”Other things might have changed too.1:25

How did Kuldeep Yadav outfox Pakistan?

“Maybe my hand used to fall over but that is well in control and faces the batter more,” he said. “At the same time, I did not lose my spin and drift, and my pace increased – all of which helped me.”These, and an increased focus on his lengths, which he has credited for his success not only during the Asia Cup but also on India’s tour of the West Indies.The increase in pace without a loss in turn means batters now don’t have as much time to read him off the pitch as the ball comes on quicker. Add to it his variations, and it leads to indecision.During his devastating spell against Pakistan, Kuldeep tossed a ball up to Fakhar Zaman that rose above the batter’s eyeline, drawing him forward. But the ball dipped sharply and landed on a perfect length and zipped away, leaving Fakhar leaden-footed and getting an outside edge with a poke. Rohit Sharma spilled it at slip, but the delivery showed the threat that has made Kuldeep so hard to play again.At 83kph, it wasn’t a particularly quick delivery for a modern spinner, but unlike before, the ball did not lose pace after pitching and skidded through, not giving the batter enough time to adjust.He displayed this ability time and again in the West Indies, where he also used the wrong’un to great effect.Kuldeep Yadav finished with the Player-of-the-Series award at the Asia Cup for his nine wickets•AFP/Getty ImagesAnil Kumble: Kuldeep has ‘more body behind every ball’ nowThe key, though, is the run-up, as Anil Kumble, legspin great and Kuldeep’s first international coach, explained.”Even when I was the coach, Kuldeep had just come into the Indian team and we were trying to get him to bowl straighter. And hats off to him, he has been able to understand that that had to be done and he’s done that to good effect,” Kumble told ESPNcricinfo. “He is now running in straighter, which means that the body is more behind the ball that he bowls and that has certainly helped the pace at which he bowls now. Naturally, he doesn’t have to bowl quicker. It’s not that the arm-speed has suddenly become quicker.”What is really good and impressive is that he’s always been a big turner of the ball so he is still able to give it a good rip. And because of the change of the angle of the run-up, it’s given him the advantage of body behind every ball.”Kumble further said that the front arm coming down in line with his body instead of going across it has, indeed, given Kuldeep greater control.Kuldeep will head into the World Cup after a special performance in the Asia Cup, where his nine wickets helped him get the Player-of-the-Series award, even though he got to bowl just the one over in the final after Mohammed Siraj blew Sri Lanka away with his opening spell.1:41

Kuldeep: My rhythm is more aggressive now

Kuldeep was rested for the first two ODIs against Australia, with Rohit explaining the importance of “preserving” the lone wristspinner in his World Cup squad.”Kuldeep is a rhythm bowler, we all know that,” Rohit said ahead of the Australia series. “But we thought of a lot of things and took this call. We have been looking at Kuldeep for the last one, one-and-a-half years, this is why we don’t want to expose him a lot.”He is coming back for the last match. There are a lot of reasons. This is the best decision for us, to have him sit out for two games and play the third. We also have two practice matches [before the World Cup opener], so for the bowling rhythm, he will be back in it.”With 31 wickets since the start of 2023, Kuldeep is the joint-highest wicket-taker in ODIs this year for players in teams that will be playing the World Cup in India.Kuldeep is anyway a point of difference in a world-class bowling attack – Tabraiz Shamsi and Noor Ahmad are the only other left-arm wristspinners at the World Cup. And with his all-round improvement, he could well become India’s ace in the hole as they look to win a second home World Cup.

Despite the loss, there is an excellent ODI side waiting to emerge; it just may take a bit longer for them to arrive than many assumed

Cameron Ponsonby10-Dec-2023Trust the result, not the process. England deserved to lose this series. But that doesn’t make them a bad side, just a new one.This is a generation of players who learned the ODI game by watching the arguably most revolutionary team to ever play the format. A team that set the template of how to play ODI cricket at full throttle, meaning every young player in the country had it pre-ordained to them that if you want in, this is how you have to do it. So they started running. Then List A cricket all but disappeared and that frenetic six-a-ball tempo was pushed further. How fast mattered as much as how many. The result is a generation of players who learned to run a T20, but not walk an ODI.On Saturday at the Kensington Oval, the only members of England’s top six to make double figures were Will Jacks and Ben Duckett. Jos Buttler was caught hooking first ball, Harry Brook was superbly run out, Zak Crawley was caught in the slips and Phil Salt was out in the first over, meaning he has now reached the end of the first powerplay in just two of his 17 ODI innings.Related

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That’s not to say this is some catastrophic disaster or structural failing of whoever. The method brought England great and historic success. It changed the way the game is played and in that regard, there’s no greater legacy. It’s just that it might be a bit slow for a while whilst we wait for Salt and Jacks to finish chapter one of The Tortoise and The Hare.”You can’t get experience if you don’t give people experience to play and be in those situations,” Buttler said in the moments after England’s four-wicket defeat. “But that’s why you give people the exposure. The series is the start of a new journey for this team – it’s a very young side barring myself in terms of experience in the number of caps, so guys will have taken a lot from this and learn a lot. There’s been some good performances throughout the way and obviously, we’re disappointed to lose the series, but the guys will be better for this one.”This isn’t a drive-by on The Hundred or an angry fist shaking at the schedule. Realistically, England are one of the three most privileged nations in the world game. The problems that exist here, do so elsewhere and tenfold.Harry Brook was run out as England’s top-order collapsed•Associated PressBut where England does stand apart is that set mantra buried into their brain of the way you must play. For all the talk of ‘freedom’ within the white-ball set-up of the last eight years and the Test side as of now, there has also never been a more narrow selection criteria you must abide by. You are free to be yourself, so long as you can strike at 160.The struggles of the ODI side in this series should result in a greater appreciation of the sheer quality of the team that came prior and an understanding that the gap between ODI cricket and T20 is greater than we thought.That gap was no better summarised by Liam Livingstone playing one of his best ODI innings to save England from 49 for 5, before spooning to mid-on just moments after his set-partner Duckett had been dismissed at the other end. A teenager who’d finally cracked quadratic equations, doing all the steps right and then sticking the wrong answer down at the end.We’ve also been here before. Eighteen months ago, England went into the final match of a three-Test series against the West Indies level, satisfied they’d controlled the opening two matches. Then they lost. After that defeat, interim head coach Paul Collingwood said he “couldn’t be more positive about what we’ve done over the past three-and-a-half-weeks.”That was a nonsense then and is a nonsense now. Elite sport is a results-oriented business and against a West Indies side widely derided for being in constant turmoil, England have now lost three series in the Caribbean in the last two years. A T20 series in January 2022. A Test series in March 2022. And now an ODI one in December 2023. The perfect hat-trick.The context of the opposition matters. This is a West Indies side going through as much of a reboot as England are. England are rebranding because they had a bad ODI World Cup. West Indies are rebranding because they didn’t get there.Jos Buttler didn’t have the best of series•Associated PressBut the T20 defeat in January 2022 preceded a World Cup win and the Test defeat preceded the Stokes-McCullum revolution. There’s nothing saying that this loss can’t lead to something similar.”This is the start of a new team and new journey,” said Buttler. “There’s obviously guys who will push to come back into this side as well but it’s very much just going to keep looking forward and be where your feet are – and just sort of build something. Give them exposure, give them opportunity – there is a hell of a lot of talent and depth and guys will get better and better.”For all the power of the previous generation, something that is matched within the current team, they also held an ability to win games slowly as well as quickly. The sim game, the middle-over period where the world switches off, but the best turn on. That skill remains to be learned.No-one has a right to be good at something they don’t do. And at a human level, there is something reassuring that England poured their heart into their preparations for the 2019 World Cup and found success. Then rocked up casually for the 2023 World Cup – and didn’t. Quantity of preparation co-related with quality of result.This loss hurt an England team that needed a win to boost morale and remind them of the quality that is housed in the changing room. The gossip after the World Cup was that there was no gossip. No fractures, no falling out, just a lack of results. This is a group that is together and ready to move forward.Progress will be difficult, with England next playing ODIs in September when Australia pay a random visit. But despite the loss, there is an excellent England ODI side waiting to emerge. It just may take a bit longer for them to arrive than many assumed.

With a blazing half-century in Ahmedabad, he shows Kings had picked the right man at the auction

Ashish Pant05-Apr-20242:50

‘Kudos to Shashank Singh for hanging in there all these years’

When Shashank Singh walked out to bat in his ninth IPL innings, Punjab Kings were 70 for 4 in the ninth over of their chase of 200 against Gujarat Titans. The required rate had rocketed to 11.47 and, according to the ESPNcricinfo forecaster, their win probability had plummeted to 4.77%.So, he had no option but to go for it. He had to take down the likes of Rashid Khan, Noor Ahmad and Mohit Sharma. He had to believe he was the “best in the world”. He did and by the end of it all, his unbeaten 29-ball 61 took Kings to an unlikely three-wicket win in Ahmedabad.Related

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Shashank will undoubtedly grab the headlines after handing Kings their second win of the season and their first on the road. But approximately three-and-a-half months ago, he had become the talking point for a different reason altogether. A reason beyond his control.On December 19, 2023, Punjab Kings successfully bid for a “Shashank Singh” during the accelerated round at the auction. Hammer down, bid sealed. Minutes later the team owners seemed to suggest to the auctioneer Mallika Sagar that this wasn’t the player they were looking for. But Sagar had moved to the next player by then, so the bid stayed.Kings later put down the confusion to a case of mistaken identity clarifying that the onboarded player was always on their targeted list. Shashank also put a statement on his social media account saying, “It’s All Cool … Thank you for trusting on me!!!!” But the “accidental signing” memes had already made their way to the internet.

It’s All Cool … Thank you for Trusting on me!!!! https://t.co/Gs9hOnRspa

— shashank singh (@shashank2191) December 20, 2023

Netravalkar got rid of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma to give wings to USA’s dreams but they fell short in the end

Sidharth Monga12-Jun-2024Life can sometimes be too good to be true.All these years after having left India, in a World Cup, in the brightest of lights, getting out not just the India captain, not just a fellow Mumbaikar, but a fellow Payyade Club player, caught by a fellow Payyade Club player at that.Saurabh Netravalkar didn’t even make that connection when out in the middle. Before the game he did warmly catch up with all of the Mumbai guys he had left behind. Then he bowled the wobble-seam ball to get Virat Kohli out for a golden duck. Then he got Rohit Sharma out, caught by Harmeet Singh, who had once driven his car up the Andheri train station platform. From one city that never sleeps to another, the city of blinding lights.Related

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The ball is coming out beautifully. Even Netravalkar doesn’t know which way it is going to seam. What chance does the batter stand? Rishabh Pant survives narrowly. Netravalkar carries on for a third over: 3-0-13-2 in the powerplay.Netravalkar is the cult hero of USA cricket right now. Indian-born Americans are carrying the USA flag and draping themselves in it for a match against India. His coach Stuart Law calls him the Iceman after his Super Over against Pakistan. He is a hero to all of us stuck with jobs that require sitting at a desk. To all of us that didn’t succeed at our dream job at the first go. A fan shouted to him from the stands that even he works from home. Netravalkar looked at him and smiled.”I love my job at Oracle,” he says, “and this [cricket] is, of course, my love. I enjoy entering the field, bowling every ball that I do. I’m blessed that I get to do what I love most of the time in the day.”We all have a bit of Saurabh Netravalkar in us.He is a Goan. A seafarer at heart. So perhaps it should not be a surprise that he has made his life so far away from home.But here he, is putting in the spell of his life against India. Within touching distance of sealing USA’s progress to the Super Eight stage. He has them under pressure. His other team-mates also have assistance from the pitch, and are keeping India on a leash.Saurabh Netravalkar dropped a tough chance from Suryakumar Yadav•ICC/Getty ImagesSuryakumar Yadav tweeted to him ten years ago that opportunities don’t happen, you create them. Both have taken different routes to opportunities and this World Cup. Suryakumar has had his struggles before he found his true self. Netravalkar found the competition too intense and came to the USA to study. Now he is under a Suryakumar catch, one of the most difficult catches to take, running back, keeping an eye on the ball, watching it fall over your shoulder, tracking it all the way through into your hands.Netravalkar does most things right, but it pops out of his hand. Suryakumar is a dangerous batter, capable of hitting the ball in unusual areas, a difficult man to set fields to. USA get too lost in the task, and on three occasions they take more than one minute making sure the field for Suryakumar is right, and are penalised five runs. The first penalty of its kind. Thirty-five off five over becomes 30 off five overs.Netravalkar blames himself. “It’s on me,” he says. “If I had taken the catch, we could have put them under more pressure.”India go on to win. It indeed is too good to be true.

New Zealand went through the 2024 edition without a fifty, and a top partnership of 34

Sampath Bandarupalli17-Jun-20244 – Maiden overs from Lockie Ferguson against Papua New Guinea. He is the second to bowl four maidens in a men’s T20I after Canada’s Saad Bin Zafar in 2021 against Panama. Before Ferguson, no one had bowled more than two maidens in a men’s T20 World Cup match.Outside of internationals, Akshay Karnewar is the only other man to do it: for Vidarbha vs Manipur, only a week before Saad’s effort, in an Indian domestic T20 at the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy.4 – Maidens in PNG’s innings overall. It was the first instance of a team bowling as many as four maidens in an innings at a men’s T20 World Cup match. There have been six instances of three maidens at the showpiece event previously, four of which came in 2024.Getty Images81 – Dot balls played out by PNG’s batters – the second-highest in a men’s T20 World Cup game. The highest is 89 dots by Uganda against New Zealand on Saturday.78 – PNG’s total against New Zealand was their second-lowest in men’s T20Is, behind the 77 all out they made against Uganda earlier in the tournament. Three of PNG’s four lowest totals in this format have come in this World Cup.34 – Partnership runs between Devon Conway and Kane Williamson for the third wicket. It was the highest partnership for New Zealand in this T20 World Cup. It was also the lowest “highest partnership” for any team in an edition of the men’s T20 World Cup where they played four or more matches. The next is 35 for Uganda, across four games in 2024.40 – Glenn Phillips’ score against West Indies was the highest for New Zealand in this tournament. They are only the fourth team to play four or more matches at a men’s T20 World Cup without an individual 50-plus score.Ireland played five matches in the 2009 edition without an individual fifty, while the highest score for Uganda in 2024 was 33. No New Zealand batter hit a fifty in the five matches they played in the 2010 edition, played in the West Indies. England don’t have a fifty in this year’s World Cup as yet, but they have the Super Eight to set that right.

They were arguably favourites for the first time in an ICC final, but that second-place feeling was as acute as ever

Firdose Moonda20-Oct-2024Second sucks. That’s it. That’s the tweet, as they say.Second sucks even if you know you were second-best. Second sucks when you’ve been second three times in the last three finals. Second sucks because, at some point, you think you’ve done enough to finish first. And South Africa were at that point this time.With England and India out of the way and defending champions Australia knocked out by their own hands, South Africa may never have a better chance to win a World Cup. No disrespect to a determined New Zealand outfit but, on pre-tournament form and semi-final performance, South Africa appeared to be the stronger and potentially better resourced and more settled side. They found themselves in the unusual position of being favourites in a final for the first time, and it seemed as though they did not know what to do with that.Despite Paul Adams’ motivational speech before play, complete with an aerial picture of the Arc de Triomphe to inspire patriotism and symbolise a central point at which people from many paths must meet, they lacked something in the field, as South Africans so often do. They lacked zip and intensity, their body language of furrowed brows and sometimes hunched shoulders did not suggest they were owning their moment as they had earned the right to. South Africa were doing that old South African cricket thing and allowing the opposition to dictate the run of play.They were taken aback by New Zealand’s fearless approach in the Powerplay and were hit off their plans. Marizanne Kapp bowled only two overs upfront, rather than usual three she has been tasked with through most of this tournament and though Ayabonga Khaka took an early wicket, she was unusually expensive. A stoic Wolvaardt later acknowledged that New Zealand’s coming out “with real intent caught us on the back foot a little bit,” and so South Africa found themselves reacting and not directing. “We thought we could sort of ride it out, hopefully take a wicket or two, but they just kept going.”With New Zealand 70 for 3 in the 11th over, South Africa had started to pull things back but never looked in control. As a result, New Zealand became the first team at this tournament to expose South Africa’s weakness in not selecting a fifth first-choice fifth bowler. They took Nadine de Klerk and Sune Luus for 34 runs in four overs combined, wrecked South Africa’s death-bowling plans and took Nonkululeko Mlaba and Khaka apart in their final overs. “They had a really good last five or six overs where they really pushed that run-rate and we were perhaps a bit off.”That is one way of explaining how South Africa sent down 10 wides and three no-balls, which showed an unusual lack of discipline. It also meant that they bowled two extra overs, which is careless in any game not least a final. They did not shell any chances – which has been a feature of this tournament – until the very last ball of the innings, but there were enough fumbles in the field to gave New Zealand the confidence to take on their arms and turns ones into twos. Ultimately, that meant the target South Africa hoped they would chase, of around 140, became almost 20 runs greater. And there, the match was lost.South Africa had reason to believe at various stages of the tournament, and the final•AFP/Getty ImagesIn some ways, it made the defeat easier to accept because at least this one lacked the brutal last-ball agony of June’s men’s T20 World Cup final which went down to the final over, or the inevitability of Australia winning again, as was the case last February. This time, South Africa had most of the second innings to process the fact that the World Cup was not theirs. Though Tazmin Brits and Laura Wolvaardt, in particular, had a promising Powerplay, South Africa’s middle-order were untested in pressure situations at this tournament and fell away. That is something South Africa will have to address in the future.For now, there is just the familiar emptiness of another trophy that was won by someone else, at a time South Africa believed was theirs. They say it so often, it seems ridiculous to keep at it, but this time (just like last time and the time before that), it felt like “the curse of not winning a World Cup,” as interim coach Dillon du Preez put it, was going to be broken. And the team felt that too, which brought an expectation of its own that probably did more harm than good. Wolvaardt described her parents as looking “more sad than I did, which is a bit heartbreaking,” but also speaks volumes about the external pressures the team continues to face. At least, she could see the lighter side of it.Related

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“Before the game, we had a discussion that we really feel this is our year. A lot of people felt that way,” Wolvaardt said. “They had some aunt who had a feeling or had a funny tingling in their pinky finger that we were going to win. That just shows that mother cricket is always in charge and has bigger plans. You can never predict what’s going to happen or write any team off.”The words Wolvaardt used shine a light on how silly the superstitions of our sport can be, even as people hold on to them when it’s all they have. Gut feelings will always come up against the cold, hard reality and the truth is that South Africa did not bring their best game to the game that mattered most. “To play one of our worst games in the tournament in the final is a bit disappointing,” Wolvaardt said.Arguably, South Africans needed this more than New Zealanders, who at least have an ODI World Cup to their names. Arguably, South Africans, who battle poverty, crime, corruption and hardship are more in need of hope than New Zealanders, whose country is in the top 10 on global living standard indexes. But South Africans also know, from experience, how to move on, and they will do that quickly. Once the tears have dried, they will realise that, in just a year’s time, at the ODI World Cup in India, they will have the chance to go again and, as South Africans always do, they will.