Spinners alone won’t be the determining factor for teams in the ODI World Cup beginning on October 5. The right balance of quicks and tweakers and how well they perform in unison will be the key, feels Muthiah Muralidaran.
In the city on Thursday for a news conference on his upcoming biopic 800, the world’s highest wicket-taker in both Test and ODI cricket, said: “Every country has good spinners.
“(Wanindu) Hasaranga is injured, not playing. But then, you have Rashid Khan from Afghanistan. From India, there’s Kuldeep Yadav, who’s very good. (Ravichandran) Ashwin too, who I regard as the best off-spinner at present, while (Ravindra) Jadeja’s also there.
“But you can’t say Indian wickets are very, very spin-friendly always, because dew is a factor sometimes, spinners then are not very effective. So, you need to have the balance between fast bowlers and spinners. Only then you have a good chance of getting through.”
The spin legend was effusive in his praise for Kuldeep, terming the left-arm chinaman as a “match-winner” for his consistent showing over the past one year. “Kuldeep is a very good bowler. He had a bad patch a few years ago, but he has got back very well in cricket.
“He’s taking wickets, so that’s why he’s there in the World Cup squad. He’s a match-winner.”
The former Sri Lanka off-spinner believes both luck and fitness will be paramount to the success of the teams in this World Cup.
“Luck makes a big part of it as right things need to happen at the right time. That has always been the case, especially in the last (2019) World Cup final. We thought New Zealand would win, but luck went on to favour England.
“Also, in 1996, we were the underdogs. But luck favoured us many times and we won. So, you have to have a little bit of luck to win the Cup. Performance apart, fitness too will be a matter of huge importance for all the teams,” Muralidaran stressed.
Praise for Gill
Former India captain Sourav Ganguly, who too was present at the event, believes India are peaking at the right time and Shubman Gill and Virat Kohli would be the key in the Cup.
“India are a team with enormous talent and they’re peaking at the right time. As for the players, I think Shubman and Virat could be the ones to watch out for, especially on good batting tracks. The way Shubman is batting, he’s in the form of his life,” Sourav said.
