IND vs ENG: Can Kuldeep Yadav, fresh from a stint with Sunil Joshi, tame England’s Bazballers in Visakhapatnam?

It was not Kuldeep Yadav’s turn to bowl. But he jumped the line; the shy and starstruck net-bowler whose turn it was did not raise an objection. The ball before, loopy and landing on good-length, his teammate and the hottest young batting talent in the country Rinku Singh had thunder-bolted Kuldeep over his head, the ball whistling into the distance like an arrow. Kuldeep wanted to serve revenge hot, even if it was only a routine net session on the eve of Uttar Pradesh’s Ranji Trophy encounter with Kerala in Alappuzha a fortnight ago.

The haste did not ruffle him. With short, busy strides, he took off, watched keenly by head coach Sunil Joshi and a handful of students who had bunked the class to watch Kuldeep. Rinku hunkered down and uncoiled his body for the reverse sweep, but before he could bring his bat down fully across from leg side towards the off side, the ball crashed onto his forearm. Rinku smiled sheepishly, the crowd gasped in shock. It was not just a staple quicker one, but one that was seemingly 25kph faster than his regular pace.

There was a time when the left-arm wrist spinner was considered too slow; here is a time when he could bowl with the pace he whims. The next ball was considerably slower—more classical in rendition—drifted away from Rinku and spun back a trifle, which Rinku, shedding adventure, defended stoutly on the back-foot. Joshi would advise him to bowl a yard fuller. He would demonstrate it to him too with a deliciously flighted ball. The latter is attentive to details, and Kuldeep in receiving the wisdom of a respected craftsman of the spin-art. Kuldeep would immediately correct his length. Joshi is content.

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“For a spinner, it’s the length that matters more than the line. You can play around with the lines, but cannot compromise with the lengths. All great spinners have had absolute mastery over their lengths. It has been the most important aspect of his bowling we have been working on, and the reason he has been successful of late,” Joshi says.

From plunging the depths of despair during the lockdown, he resurfaced as one half of India’s potent spin pair (with Jadeja) in the World Cup. Now, with Jadeja injured for the Visakhapatnam Test, he could return to the longer format after 14 months. His Test career has been a tale of scattered appearances—eight outings in seven years, despite an impressive tally of 34 wickets at an average of 21, striking once every 37th ball, a four or more wickets in third innings. Even in his last Test–against Bangladesh in Chattogram–he snared eight wickets and was the man of the match. But in the era of India’s most prolific spin pair–Jadeja and R Ashwin–the dilemma of selectors is understandable.

For a long time, he was their understudy. Then during his downtime came along Axar Patel, whose superior batting numbers thrust him back to the domestic grind. “But he has made good use of it, picked up the pieces and fought back to the team. He has developed more control, got fitter and is confident of getting wickets. For a spinner that is important, confidence. I see no reason why he can’t be successful in Tests. He has the confidence, the hunger and the variations,” points out Joshi.

Whereas he seemed restrained about unleashing his full repertoire of trickery in the World Cup, at the nets and later in the match, he was the twinkle-eyed trickster that swallowed Steve Smith and Co in Dharamsala to hand India a series-winning victory. On a surface that was not the spinner’s best friend, he spun the ball both ways to the right hander. The stock ball was the one that snakes back to the right-hander, but it is the one that breaks away that enhances his potency.

“It is a really difficult ball for the right-hander to negotiate if it’s turning. It’s difficult to read him off his hands, and if you depend on reading him off the pitch, the ball can really surprise you,” explains Joshi, who has been involved in his comeback journey, first at the NCA and then with the Uttar Pradesh team.

By being a left-arm wrist-spinner alone Kuldeep offers a different proposition. The angles and trajectories he treads are different; as are his release points and lengths. Rare as his tribe is, most batsmen are unaccustomed to his ways. That’s not all. The variations are eye-watering—there is the stock ball that comes in to the right-handed batsmen, the wrong one, the flipper, and the quicker that beat Rinku to the reverse-sweep. He could be the antidote to reverse-sweep-happy England batsmen. Now that he has conquered the art of modulating pace without any discernible changes in variations, he could reclaim his stakes with the red ball.

But the biggest gift, Joshi emphasises, is his ability to turn the ball. “It’s what spinners are supposed to do, aren’t they? But not all can turn the ball on any surface. Kuldeep can, whether it is a turner or not, and that makes him really special,” says Joshi.

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Besides, the Bazballers have not yet been tested by a quality wrist-spinner in their march. It’s worth noting though that Abrar Ahmed did grab 17 wickets at an average of 27 in Pakistan two years ago. Pakistan’s second highest wicket-taker too was a leg-spinner, Zahid Mahmood, who though leaked nearly seven runs an over. Wrist-spin is an old weakness of England, one that Ben Stoke’s gung-ho group has not countered much in their march.

Surely, the England batters might have come prepared. He is no stranger to most of them, though chiefly with the white ball in hand. He had harassed them so much in the white-ball series in 2018 that Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow sought the help of a specially-designed bowling machine Merlyn to help them out. The next game, he nailed them both and he would quip: “The machine doesn’t have hands or fingers.” This particular puzzle will need solving in the middle, should he play in Visakhapatnam. And how Kuldeep would be waiting for his turn to bowl.

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