New Delhi: India captain MS Dhoni may have given a long rope to an erratic Ishant Sharma but his indifferent performances of late came in for sharp criticism from former players who said it was high time the lanky paceman was dropped as he has “stopped learning”.
The former players said that Ishant has now played more than 50 Tests and such a poor display from him could no longer be accepted as it was affecting the team’s performance.
Former Indian seamer Madan Lal and noted fast bowling coach TA Sekar said that there are “plenty of mistakes” that need to be rectified if the Delhi speedster wants to regain his form.
“I don’t whether it is about pressure of performing or not but Ishant has stopped learning. He is not a ‘baccha’ (kid) anymore. He has played over 50 Test matches and he should have been a strike bowler and leader of pace attack”, Madan Lal, a former India coach and national selector told PTI.
“I think it’s high time that Indian team management tries out Ishwar Pandey. You have to pick bowlers, who would win games for you. Look at Mohammed Shami. When he runs in, you feel that he is going to get wickets for you. I don’t get that feeling when I see Ishant bowling,” he said.
Ishant has taken only 149 wickets in 53 Test matches and has a strike-rate as low as 69.7 (nearly 11.3 overs) per wicket while average runs per wicket is nearly 40. He has only three five-wicket hauls in 53 Tests so far.
In ODIs, Ishant has only 102 wickets from 72 games with an economy rate of 5.72 and not a single five-wicket haul. In fact, he has taken four wickets only four times in 72 ODIs.
“If you try to stop runs, it can never happen in international cricket. You have to pick wickets and know the art of dismissing batsmen. Ishant is not trying to pick wickets. He is simply not pitching the ball in right area and trying to bowl too fast,” Lal explained.
Sekar, who has been Dennis Lillee’s assistant for over two decades at India’s pace bowling cradle MRF Pace Foundation, feels that the bowler is just “putting the ball rather than bowling it”.
“There are too many mistakes in his bowling. Firstly, he is just putting the ball rather than bowling it. His turnover timing while delivering the ball is wrong while he doesn’t have his wrists and fingers right behind the seam as it should be,” Sekar, who has worked with premier fast bowlers like Javagal Srinath, Venkatesh Prasad, Zaheer Khan at MRF pace academy, said.
Sekar feels that bowling coach Joe Dawes needs to address these mistakes that have crept in Ishant’s bowling.
“I don’t think a bowling coach’s job is to wear those big gloves during the break and gather the balls or jog a round or two with the players. I am not very sure also whether Ishant knows about what are the mistakes that are there in his bowling,” Sekar said. (PTI)