Indo-Pak’s great but in Colombo, they just revived a cricket art form

• There are three left-armers from the land of Shane Warne. Jon Holland takes 4/39 against the US in a league game.

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• India’s left-arm spinner Ravinder Jadeja takes 4/17 in the warm-up against Australia.

• 19 left-arm spinners happen to be part of world cricket’s Big Eight teams here.

Enough to lift the spirits of any left-armer, especially if he has seen the art decline in the past decade.

The West Indies have been humiliated by India in the quarter-final but ask their manager Jimmy Adams, a mean wrist spinner in his playing days, about the left-arm slow bowlers in the tournament and he smiles.

“Just tell Mr Bishan Singh Bedi that all’s well with the world. Our art is alive and kicking, the temporary slump seems to be over,” he says. On a more serious note, he says: “Actually these arts never die, it is just a circle. You might have a certain type of bowling style dominating for some time but soon a bunch comes and changes it all.”

And statistics in this tournament show that they certainly have. With leading wicket-takers Shane Warne and Muthiah Muralitharan making news both on and off the field, the cricketing fraternity failed to take notice of the untiring southpaw from New Zealand, Daniel Vettori.

But talk to a cross-section of the promising left-armers here and they will vouch for Vettori’s influence. Syed Wasim from Karachi has just watched Vettori on TV.

Ditto for Ravinder Jadeja of Jamnagar.

The Kiwi, they say, has been their role model and telly coach. “Have his poster in my room”, says Wasim. “His control is brilliant and he can read the mind of the batsman.” Jadeja’s dream is to meet him once and ask him how he manages to give such a tweak to the ball.

Dipak Patel, the offie who surprised everybody during the 1992 World Cup and now the Kiwi under-19 coach, is pleased as punch. “It’s an honour for New Zealand cricket and Danny to have the spinners from the sub-continent emulating him.” Patel says he understands the phenomenon since he has two such boys in his team. “Roneel Hira and Jason Donnelly swear by him and just the other day, they conceded 40 runs from 20 overs bowling in tandem. I wish I could have been a left-armer in this era.”

In the Bangladesh camp, though, Vettori has competition. The talk here is about Mohammad Rafique, the country’s most popular cricketer. “Everybody wants to be Rafique in our country. For a left-hander, there seems to be just one option: bowl spin and be a big hitter,” says Saqibul Hasan.

Still, isn’t five in a squad of 15 a bit too much? Assistant coach Abedeen Nazmul explains why not: “We had quite a few left-handers in the side, so we groomed them to be spinners. It’s great to have a left-arm spinner since most teams have right-handed batsmen.”

Patel gives more details about this left’s advantage over right. “The ball drifts in first and later moves away from the bat. This is the toughest ball to play,” he says.