Mohammed Siraj
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Contents |
A brief biography
As in 2023, Oct
Rahul Pandey, Nov 3, 2023: The Indian Express
Kusal Mendis had heard the sound of stumps rattling and some 30,000 people at the Wankhede going berserk, but he just had to make sure he had been cleaned up. So, he looked behind. Perhaps hoping for a split second that his ears had deceived him. They hadn’t. Mohammed Siraj had run through him and Sri Lanka once again. Siraj bagged three wickets within his first two overs as the Indian bowlers, riding on an inspired five-wicket haul by Mohammed Shami, pierced through the Sri Lankan batting line up. In Mumbai on Thursday they were bowled out for just 55. In mid-September, for 50 in the final of the Asia Cup. Siraj had a major role to play in that famous win too, which set the tone for India’s unbeaten charge at the World Cup.
After his 6/21 in that final though, he looked back at another ODI against Sri Lanka – in January. “Last time, I did the same against them at Trivandrum. Got four wickets early, couldn’t get the five-for. Jitna naseeb mein hota hai wahi milta hai, aaj mera naseeb tha (You only get what’s in your fate. Today, a six-fer was in my fate),” he said.
Fate and faith have been the bedrock of Siraj’s phenomenal rise as a leading fast bowler. Former India fielding coach R Sridhar seconds.
“God has been kind to him and with his father’s blessings, he’s had the right people at the right place at the right time,” he tells The Indian Express before adding how Siraj has forged his own naseeb.
By being a receptive player, that’s the first observation Sridhar has of him. “Siraj is very naive, like a clean slate. Very coachable, no baggage. Always seeking out and open to ideas.”
Then comes an inspiring trait from the man whose celebration Siraj has now imported from football to cricket.
Like Cristiano Ronaldo, the 29-year-old is a workhorse. It was on display in Mumbai the other night. As it was during his four-wicket-over in the Asia Cup Final in September. Steaming in at full throttle and having struck thrice in the over already, Siraj sprinted all the way down to long on to avoid a boundary off his own bowling.
It would leave Virat Kohli in splits at the slip cordon. Sridhar admits to having a laugh while watching it unfold live. “He could’ve even stopped it,” he chuckles before the conversation veers to the man who stood in the cordon.
“Siraj doesn’t have to look too far for inspiration. Him being close quarters to Virat round the year, changing franchise and going to RCB, heading the bowling attack there under Virat has really helped him.”
Debut story
Sridhar flips the pages back to Siraj’s Test debut in Melbourne three years ago.
“He didn’t bowl till lunch, and then didn’t have a great first spell. Four overs, 30 runs something,” he recalls. “Then he came back and the dressing room chat was, ‘Think the ball will start doing a little extra now. You can make the ball talk.’ Because the wicket was drier and getting quicker. We thought he can come in more useful when the ball gets older and starts swinging.”
And swing he did. Thrice away from Cameron Green before bringing one in trap him LBW. Keeping it full and on the stumps for Labuschagne until one strayed down the leg and was nicked to the leg slip. Three more wickets in the second innings and by the end of the match, the then India fielding coach had a one liner for the debutant you can rewatch on bcci.tv.
“Maut daal diye Miyan! (You killed it!).”
What makes the debut even more memorable are the tragic circumstances which unraveled during the tour.
Sridhar remembers it like yesterday. “We landed in Sydney and on the second day unfortunately, he lost his father. He couldn’t have gone back and come back in time to play the series as per Covid protocols. Ravi Shastri spoke to his brother and everyone involved, and he took the decision that Siraj will have to stay back. Important conversation happened there with Ravi, Arun, myself and Siraj, on channelising his energy. It was what his father would’ve wanted. His dream was for Siraj to get a Test cap. Two tests later, he was leading the Indian bowling attack. Would you have imagined that happening? Felt like somebody up there was playing the cards.”
Test cricket route
Sridhar, who saw Siraj make his first appearance for India across all three formats during his tenure with the national team, believes that after meager returns on his T20I and ODI starts, a strong first Test series in Australia and his red-ball career since have upped the quick’s white ball credentials.
Now a mainstay in India’s white-ball team, he was then overlooked for three ODIs and as many T20Is that preceded the Tests in Australia. “In hindsight, it was good that he didn’t play those games. Gave him a lot of time to work on his red ball skills. Not just his bowling but also his fitness,” Sridhar says. “It took a while for him to learn the nuances of international cricket but I think once he made his Test debut, his white ball performances started getting better.”
For starters, it is Siraj’s length — straight out of the Test bowling manual. During his seven over mayhem in Colombo last month, the right arm pacer had pitched 72 percent of his overall deliveries in the good length region. At this World Cup, Siraj – alongwith Bumrah and Shami – have been relentless in pitching the ball in the 6-8m zone.
Then, his use of the angles from bowling wide/close to the stumps coupled with the ability to swing/seam the ball. Like the delivery he used to remove Sri Lankan captain Kusal Mendis the other night. In the lead up to the wicket-taking delivery, Siraj had bowled closer to the stumps and taken the ball away from the right handers.
The wicket ball one however, was bowled from wide of the crease, and swooshed in to crackle the top of off. Upon first glance, it felt like it had come in an awful lot. But one needs to revisit the trajectory mapper, which was shown by the broadcasters afterwards. While the release point was almost in line to the wide ball marking, by the time it pitched, the ball had come around the fictional fourth stump and seemed destined to go down the middle and leg. Mendis’ front foot defence on the middle stump line made sense. The ball not moving as much and affecting the off stump didn’t. Then again, it’s a delivery Siraj has chiseled quite a bit over the years.
Having lost his inswinger, it’s the wobble seam delivery that Siraj relies upon to nip the ball into the right handers, and away from the left handers. England’s Moeen Ali and Sam Curran would remember those. Siraj would induce edges off both southpaws enroute to a famous win at the Lord’s Test back in 2021.
“That Lord’s Test did him a world of good,” Sridhar believes. With that slope? “Yeah. Arun had prepared him for that 2.5 meter drop. Virat put a ball in his hand. Bowling wicket to wicket… that just took his confidence level to another degree.” And then, at the start of the year, India’s present bowling coach Paras Mhambrey went gaga over the same delivery. After Siraj had used it to run through the gates of right-handed Wanindu Hasaranga. In Trivandrum.
On Thursday at the Wankhede, one of those bamboozled its way through Dushmantha Chameera – almost picking up an inside edge as it went past the stumps. Even KL Rahul couldn’t get to it with a full stretch dive. Siraj had maybe put a little too much into it, or as he’d suggest: a wicket off that delivery wasn’t in his naseeb. Good for India though, he doesn’t leave it all in the hands of fate.
YEAR-WISE DEVELOPMENTS
2019
February 9, 2022: The Times of India
New Delhi: India pacer Mohammed Siraj says he was asked to “quit cricket and drive auto” with his father after a poor 2019 IPL season, making him think that his career was over. Siraj’s 7 wickets in 9 matches at an economy rate of nearly 10 reflected his franchise RCB’s disastrous 2019 outing. His worst performance came against KKR when he was hit for five sixes and 36 runs in 2. 2 overs, which included two beamers, forcing captain Virat Kohli to take him off.
“When I bowled those two beamers against KKR, people said ‘quit cricket and go back and drive autos with your father’,” Siraj told the RCB podcast. “There were so many such comments. People don’t see the struggle behind all this. But I remember when I first got selected how Mahi bhai (MS Dhoni) told me to not listen to people.
“You do well today and they’ll praise you and when you don’t, the same people will abuse you. Don’t ever take it seriously. And yes, the same people who trolled me then now say I’m the best. ”
2023: top wicket-taker of the Sri Lanka series
Prasanth Menon, January 17, 2023: The Times of India
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Not often do you see a fielding captain deploying four slips and a leg slip in white-ball cricket, especially in Indian conditions. And that too on a pitch where the team batting first has scored close to 400 runs.
But on Sunday evening at the Greenfield stadium here in Thiruvananthapuram, Indian skipper Rohit Sharma decided to place such an attacking field in the final ODI of the three-match series because Mohammed Siraj was causing havoc among the Sri Lankan batsmen.
Siraj, who looks to be in fine rhythm while running in and was the most impressive bowler in the first two ODIs against the Lankans, had reserved his best for last. In an inspired opening spell, he plotted the downfall of the visitors by showcasing the quintessential abilities of a new-ball bowler: he managed to take the ball away from the batsmen, hold its line and bring it in too. The 28-year-old, who finished with career-best figures of 4/32 and emerged as the top-wicket-taker in the series with nine wickets, attributes his success to his ploy of attacking the batsmen in his opening burst.
"My plan was to take as many wickets as possible with the new ball and put the opposition under pressure. Even if I concede boundaries, I am okay with it as long as I am able to claim a couple of wickets and put the opposition on the back foot," he said.
Siraj's plan seems to be working well as he had the most wickets (15) for an international bowler in the powerplay in ODIs last year. For that, he credits the wobble-seam delivery that he has managed to develop. "With wobble seam, neither I know nor the batsmen knows how much the ball tends to move. Sometimes, the ball might hold its line, sometimes it moves into the batsman. I take a lot of wickets with wobble seam. For me, it is effective. I have got success with it and trust wobble seam more," he said.
The Hyderabad pacer made his T20 debut for India back in 2017 before getting a maiden ODI call-up two years later, and was rewarded with a Test cap the following year. "I had inswing first but then I lost it after a while. So I developed the outswinger. Since I couldn't bowl the inswing anymore, I developed the wobble-seam delivery. It took a lot of time for me to be effective with wobble seam. Now both the outswing and wobble-seam deliveries are proving to be helpful.
"The seam position I use is for a natural outswinger. When I use the wobble seam, the ball position tilts towards fine leg. I try to hit the deck hard when I use wobbled seam because it is more effective," Siraj said. Though he made his international debut in T20Is, where his economy rate proves to be his undoing, the pacer seems to be on his own in the ODIs and Tests and has risen to the occasion in Jasprit Bumrah's absence. While the expressive pacer's intent can be gauged by the way he runs in to bowl, he seems to have found a way to surprise the batsmen. "If I execute my line and length properly, it will be difficult for batsmen to hit. Whether it is Tests, T20Is or ODIs, if you keep bowling in the right areas, rewards will come. "
With the Tests against Australia to follow and the ODI World Cup later on, Siraj's ability to provide breakthroughs with the new ball will be crucial.
WHAT IS A WOBBLE-SEAM DELIVERY?
- When a fast bowler bowls such a delivery, the seam will wobble slightly from side to side, unlike a conventional pacer's delivery in which the seam stays upright.
- If the bowler bends his back and hits the deck hard, the wobble-seam delivery will deviate unpredictably off the pitch.
- England pacer James Anderson is credited with inventing the delivery, which he says he developed after watching Mohammad Asif up close on Pakistan's tour of England in 2010.
- The delivery is usually bowled by holding the ball as one would for a regular seamer's delivery, with the ring and middle finger on either side of the seam, but much wider apart so that the seam is more visible.
- The trick lies in how the ball is released, with the wrist ‘locked' so the ball is not ‘pushed' out of the hand like an usual delivery, giving it a chance to wobble.
- Many top international bowlers, like Siraj, now have their own version of the wobble-seam delivery.
