Revision as of 01:29, 10 July 2015

Zaheer Khan reaches 300-wicket mark in Test cricket

TNN | Dec 22, 2013

The Times of India

Early life

Zaheer Khan was born on October 7, 1978,

300 wickets, and counting

On Dec 22, 2013 Zaheer Khan became the fourth Indian to achieve the 300-wicket mark in Test cricket when he dismissed Jacques Kallis on the fifth day of the first Test at the Wanderers in Johannesburg on Sunday.

But Zaheer was lucky to get the wicket of Kallis as the batsman was ruled out leg before wicket even through there was an inside edge on to his pads.

Zaheer joins Kapil Dev, Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh in the elite list.

A fit again Zaheer came up with a superb bowling effort to grab 4/88 in the first innings.

Zaheer has gone through a lot of late. Injuries, lack of form and fitness issues had seen him out of the Indian team for quite a while. It was a difficult road back for him to come back.

Speed and technique

Zaheer, when he started off in the Champions Trophy in Kenya in 1999, used to work up a pace of 140 plus. Over the years his pace came down but he added some more skill in his repertoire like the knuckle ball and the art of reverse swinging the old ball.

Zaheer, alongwith Yuvraj Singh, trained hard for 42 days at a stretch at Metasport Athletic Performance Centre in France where they learned new things in terms of exercise, food and diet.

Known for his ability to swing the ball both ways, Zaheer is regarded as the best fast bowler to have emerged from India after Kapil Dev and considered among the best left-hand fast bowlers in the world along with Wasim Akram and Chaminda Vaas.

Triumphs

Zaheer was the highest wicket-taker for India in the 2011 World Cup, reinventing himself from several injuries to become the backbone of Indian pace attack.

Zaheer had rocked international cricket when he clean bowled Steve Waugh in the Champions Trophy in 2000 and it was largely due to Zaheer's exploits with the ball that India won a Test series in England under the captaincy of Rahul Dravid in 2007.

He worked with a world-renowned trainer for six weeks in France to get back in shape and then went to South Africa to work with a specialist on his fielding and bowling.

It's remarkable to note what Zaheer Khan has achieved despite having a career that has been hit by several injuries.

A “finished” bowler

India Today

Sharda Ugra February 26, 2009

Zaheer has re-written the narrative of his own unpredictable story, re-defined the course of his career and has emerged, finally, as the bowler India have waited for him to be. He has gone from edgy, brittle paceman to the leader of India’s attack, the man who has delivered some of its most emphatic victories in the last two seasons. From an uncertain performer always on the fringe of hitting his stride to a mature bowler the Indians now rely on. He forms one half of what some call the best new ball-pair in the world, whose presence gives the Indian bowling attack its heft and will make all opposition think twice about loading their decks in bowlers’ favour.

It is the fast bowler’s friend and enemy, capable of repeatedly torquing itself into biomechanical punishment and equally capable of succumbing to stress and collapse. Until recently, such physical unpredictability was Zaheer’s calling card, from his high-decibel debut in 2000 all the way to England 2007. When after an indifferent first day in Lord’s, he took 18 wickets and set up India’s historic series win. Before that he had limped out of landmark series in Pakistan and Australia (twice). He says, “I would do everything right, do the fitness, the rehab. I would return, nets would be fine but then some other part would break down in a match.”

In Pakistan 2006, former coach Greg Chappell had privately declared Zaheer ‘finished’, words that reached him.

The county game, says VVS Laxman, “transformed” Zaheer. “He had always looked to bowl quick and take wickets. But county cricket taught him to bowl within himself, when to attack and when to contain.” It is an art that the fast bowler understands as he gets older. When he finds that groove, he goes from struggling apprentice to master, a stage many believe Zaheer is entering now. His best is yet to be. Caught up in the tides of his career, there is a lot that we forget about him. That Zaheer is from Shrirampur, a town not easily found on maps. That he bowled with a leather ball only at the age of 17, encountered weight training only at 20. That he is smart enough to get into an instrumentation engineering course and was mocked by his college principal for dreaming about a cricket ticket. That this cool world traveller was once a boy easily felled by the dessert table at a buffet. Today, he remembers that kid by rewarding himself with something sweet after a good day at the office.

But what is this thing bowlers call rhythm? With all the patience of a man trying to teach trigonometry to a 10-year-old, Zaheer explains, “It is a feeling that everything is in control. You size up a batsman and decide that you can get him if you bowl in a particular area, and then that’s exactly what you are able to do. Your body and mind are in sync, you are on autopilot, there’s no stress on your body, you don’t feel tired, everything is smooth.”

Zaheer’s Test progress

50 wickets in his 19th Test @ 39.02 vs England, Headingley 2002

100 in his 37th Test @ 36.13, vs B’desh, Chittagong, 2004

150 in his 49th test @ 34.0 vs England Trent Bridge, 2007