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Journalism of Courage
For Mumbai8217;s young left-arm spinner Iqbal Abdulla, the moments will linger on. Today he had an unexpected guide, in Sachin Tendulkar. For about fifteen minutes, under the burning sun at Motera, in front of the eager, almost voyeuristic media, Tendulkar took him out onto the field and gave him tips on how to bowl a swerve ball, a delivery that moves away from a left-hander in the air.
8220;It was simply wow. For such a great player like him to give me tips, I can8217;t express what I feel. He told me in the morning that he will teach me a secret delivery after the match against Madhya Pradesh gets over. After the match in the dressing room, he asked me whether I know how to bowl a swerve delivery. I said no and then there we were. He told me how to grip the ball and release it. I will have to practise it a lot to be able to bowl it,8221; said Iqbal, still dazed by the time he shared with Tendulkar, adding 8220;Do you know of any photographer who froze the moment?8221;
He also talked about his other memories with Tendulkar. 8220;I bowl to him sometimes at the nets. It8217;s an amazing feeling to bowl to a player like him. I think about what I should do to beat him, and have succeeded a couple of times.8221;
Junior cricket has already been witness to the capabilities of the left-arm spinner. He had earned a bagful of wickets for the Mumbai under-17 and under-19 teams 8212; 52 from eight matches in under-17 and 38 from 9 in under-19.
Just yesterday, in the Twenty20 match against Haryana, he bagged 5 wickets giving away only 10 runs in his four overs. Today however, he was slightly less impressive against MP, with figures of 4-0-24-1.
8220;Today we were bowling second, so there was less opportunity to experiment and test the batsmen,8221; Iqbal said, who idolises New Zealand8217;s Daniel Vettori.
And he has already had an opportunity to meet his role model. 8220;During the Champions Trophy I met him and asked a few things about the arm-ball. He was very forthcoming.8221;
The 18-year-old caught the attention of the cricket bigwigs when he took three wickets 8212; Marvan Attapattu, Upul Tharanga and Farveez Mahroof 8212; for MCA XI in Sri Lanka8217;s warm-up match before the start of the Champions Trophy.
But he still rates his figures of 10-0-30-0 against South Africa in another warm-up match as his best performance so far. 8220;It was the first time I was playing against big players. South Africa looked set fro a big score they scored 320. On top of that I was bowling against players like Graeme Smith, Jacques Kallis and Mark Boucher during powerplays and slog overs. I enjoyed bowling against Smith as he is a left-hander and for a left-arm spin bowler, it is the greatest challenge to bowl to a left-hander,8221; recounted Iqbal, who shifted base from Ajamgarh in UP to Mumbai four years ago on the insistence of his coach Naushad Khan also a left-arm spinner.
Now he is aware that on Thursday, he would be up against another another very good player of left-arm spin, Sourav Ganguly, when Mumbai take on Bengal in their Twenty20 match. 8220;Dada ko to check karna parega.8221;
Muzumdar sets up Mumbai win
8226; Mumbai skipper Amol Muzumdar8217;s quickfire 57 off 35 balls helped Mumbai win their Twenty20 tie against Madhya Pradesh by 44 runs here at Motera on Wednesday. After being put into bat, Mumbai posted a mammoth 188 for six on the board.
The two stars of Mumbai8217;s yesterday8217;s win against Haryana 8212; Sachin Tendulkar and Ajinkya Rahane 8212; fell cheaply, leaving skipper and young Rohit Sharma to bail the side out.
MP could not make a good start to their chase as both Zaheer Khan and Ajit Agarkar got breakthroughs.
In Mumbai, Karnataka outplayed Orissa by 44 runs to record their second successive win. Put in to bat, a fluent half-century by India skipper Rahul Dravid and a fine effort from Devraj Patil helped Karnataka set a target of 158 and they dismissed Orissa for just 113.
Brief scores: Mumbai 188/6 A Muzumdar 57, R Sharma 39, M Khote 31; A Ali 2/39 beat MP 144/6 B Tomar 57, R Bakshi 40; A Agarkar 2/27.
Karnataka 157/7 R Dravid 54, D Patil 44 beat Orissa 113 P Mullick 40.
