Swing, Bounce, Control and Knuckle, Deepak Chahar provides bowling masterclass vs Punjab Kings

There was plenty of swing on offer. In between, he used the short ball to good effect. The final bit in the three-part saga of the bowling masterclass was using a slow knuckleball to confound the batsman. The fact that it was bowled with control only made it potent. At the Wankhede stadium, Deepak Chahar provided a masterclass of bowling that covered all the facets. Batsmen were confounded by swing, the variations in both length and pace. In four overs inside the powerplay, Punjab Kings had lost their batting. Chahar had put on a display of bowling which will be termed as one of the best spells of the IPL.

A summary of each of the wickets and the background behind those dismissals highlights the intelligence of Chahar. In his first over, Chahar was getting the ball to swing in. However, he set up Mayank Agarwal brilliantly. In all the previous deliveries, the ball was swinging in. When Agarwal took strike, he might have been expecting the inswinger. However, Chahar unleased the outswinger. It pitched on a good length as Agarwal played inside the line of the ball. It hit the top of off, exactly as mentioned in the coaching manual. Chahar would term Agarwal’s wicket ‘his favorite’.

Variations in pace and length

Chahar was bowling in excess of 130 kmph, which is just about over 80 mph. On a Wankhede deck which saw the ball stick on the wicket, this pace was just about ideal. In every delivery, Chahar was thinking differently. In the same over, he tried the two-card trick. The first ball to Chris Gayle swung in. The second ball swung away and Gayle played the drive. Though the catch was dropped, Chahar had sown doubts in the minds.

When Gayle hit two fours off Chahar, he realised that he had to do something different with his pace and length. In the fifth over, Chahar decided to bowl the knuckle ball. It stuck on the wicket and bounced awkwardly as Gayle mistimed the drive. This time Ravindra Jadeja, who had effected a brilliant run-out of KL Rahul, took a stunning catch.

Keen observation

Nicholas Pooran had not started the IPL on a positive note. In the first game of IPL 2021, he fell for a duck against Rajasthan Royals. There was also one more weakness. At the start of his innings, Pooran is vulnerable to the short ball. Chahar spotted that and bowled the short ball wide outside off. Pooran mistimed the pull and fell for his second consecutive duck.

The final wicket completed Chahar’s best figures in IPL. The right-arm pacer bowled a full ball that swung away outside off. Deepak Hooda, who had smashed 64 off 28 balls, toe-ended the drive to mid-off. In seven overs, Chahar had taken 4/13 and Punjab Kings never recovered from 26/5. 

A thinking bowler

“f I take a wicket or bowl a maiden over then obviously we can take the momentum. It’s a big responsibility I’ve been having since the last four years. As a bowler, my plan is to bowl dots if I don’t take wickets. The bowlers from the other end will also be able to take wickets,” Chahar said during the post-match presentation.

This spell is a redemption for Chahar after a tough couple of years. After that high of 6/7 against Bangladesh which had a hat-trick, Chahar was laid low by a stress fracture. In IPL 2020, Chahar was impacted by the coronavirus. With this spell, he has once again found his mojo. The key will be to sustain it.