AJANTHA MENDIS

[mal]

MENDIS is he going to be one of the greatest ever spin bowlers in history?
Murali and Warnnney have set the bar
Murali the best offie ever ?
Warne the best leggie ever?
Mendis the best mystery spinner ever ?

The way Mendis has taunted the Indians in recent times is suggesting he is a star
His ability to bowl offies/leggies/armballs etc is fascinating
I reckon he is a potential 500 wicket + bowler at Test level
However in the 60s there was a mystery spinner for Australia called Johnny Gleeson
He was hailed a potential star and batsman had difficulties in picking his deliveries.
Once used to Gleeson, batters then diminished his effectiveness
Will this happen to Mendis as well ?
I dont think so
Im looking forward to watching this enourmous talent in years to come

He should however FITTINGLY change his christain name
Ajantha to Tree....

[GWW]

Is he the son of ex Sri Lankan captain Duleep?

[blink]

MENDIS is he going to be one of the greatest ever spin bowlers in history?

He has had an amazing start to his career:
25 wickets in 10 ODIs @ 18.0 (majority against India)
26 wickets in 3 Tests @ 37.6 (all against India)

Hopefully he can keep it up, can't wait for him to come up against the Aussies and the Poms.

[Media Park]

Averaging over 8 wickets per Test is great...
But runs per wicket (37.6!?) works out to 900(!?!) runs he's conceded?
Three tests, six innings, 150 runs per innings(?) on average?
That can't be right...
Can it?

[Media Park]

Ahh, cricinfo....
Bowling average of 18.38 in Tests...
Had me worried...

[Bob Loblaw]

The best thing about him is that every wicket he takes, its one less Murali can get

[blink]

Averaging over 8 wickets per Test is great...
But runs per wicket (37.6!?) works out to 900(!?!) runs he's conceded?
Three tests, six innings, 150 runs per innings(?) on average?
That can't be right...
Can it?

That is strike rate mate! Balls per wicket.

His average is 18.38 for Test, 9.92 for ODIs.

[Media Park]

my bad...
i only ever see that as average...

[Aerie]

Watched a bit of him on You Tube. He has almost a medium pace action - very upright when in delivery. His strength seems to be the variety in his delivery without too much of a noticeable change in action. Has a regular offy and a doosra delivery where he pushes out with his middle finger from behind the ball - god knows how he can control it, but he does. Doesn't seem to get much drift, but does get a bit of dip. Also didn't turn the ball a great deal - but just enough both ways. This was watching an ODI though, so perhaps he teases the batsman a bit more in a Test match. Will be interesting to watch how he goes in the coming years and brilliant for Sri Lanka if he turns out as good as Murali. If only Australia had a gun spinner coming through at the right age after Warne.

[mal]

That middle finger doosra type is a delivery I used to bowl
It is actually quite an easy delivery to perfect when playing on hard wickets
Also bowling it with an inswing action can futher extentiate the doosra type delivery
MT79 has faced a few in the nets but still clobbers my doosmalsra.
Believe it or not I used to bowl offies/leggies/doosras etc [but extremely poorly may I add]
Its great to see a master craftsman in TreMendis in his trade

TreMendis is exciting to watch.
Hope he takes plenty of wickets [I love Bob Laidlaws post ]

[luvcricket]

Are you kidding Mal or what?

[mal]

Are you kidding Mal or what?

Im not pissing in your pocket
I bowled the doosra about 30 years ago as a kid
Its actually a very simple technique to bowl it
BUT
My doosra to any batsman of any ability was an easy delivery to pick and negotiate
But against low division hard wicket sloggers it worked a treat

[mighty_tiger_79]

the malsra

it did get me a few times initially - definately a wicket taking delivery to the sloggers and others that dont know how to handle sharp turning deliveries

[brod]

MENDIS is he going to be one of the greatest ever spin bowlers in history?

He has had an amazing start to his career:
25 wickets in 10 ODIs @ 18.0 (majority against India)
26 wickets in 3 Tests @ 37.6 (all against India)

Hopefully he can keep it up, can't wait for him to come up against the Aussies and the Poms.

Slowed down a bit

FIRST CLASS 145 wickets in 23 matches @ 15.43
LIST A 85 wickets in 37 matches @ 10.7
TWENTY20 17 wickets in 10 matches @ 10.41
TEST 26 wickets in 3 matches @ 18.4
ODI 48 wickets in 18 matches @ 10.12
T20I 11 wickets in 3 matches @ 5.0

[brod]

Going to miss out on a chance to inflate those stats by missing two test series (starts 26/12) vs Bangladesh

[Adelaide Hawk]

Are you kidding Mal or what?

Im not pissing in your pocket
I bowled the doosra about 30 years ago as a kid
Its actually a very simple technique to bowl it
BUT
My doosra to any batsman of any ability was an easy delivery to pick and negotiate
But against low division hard wicket sloggers it worked a treat

You are so right with this one Mal. Contemporary bowlers aren't bowling anything that hasn't been bowled many times before, it just that a particular bowler may come along with a different technique and turn that ball into a lethal weapon ... some with the assistance of dubious actions but I won't get into that

It's like when Warnie perfected the Flipper. The way the media reacted gave the impression that he invented it. Truth is, leggies have been bowling the flipper since the 1950s, but nobody could bowl it with the length and force that Warnie could.

I still laugh at the vision of all the dismissed English batsmen sitting up above the sightboards with binoculars trying to work out the Warne "mystery". All he was doing was bowling leg spin ... just one hell of a lot better than anyone who came before him.

It also amuses me the way people carry on about "reverse swing" like it's some revolutionary trend. I was bowling it 30 years ago, but back then we'd never heard the term "reverse swing", we just used to make the ball swing in the opposite direction.

Haven't seen Mendis bowl but looking forward to it.

[bayman]

Are you kidding Mal or what?

Im not pissing in your pocket
I bowled the doosra about 30 years ago as a kid
Its actually a very simple technique to bowl it
BUT
My doosra to any batsman of any ability was an easy delivery to pick and negotiate
But against low division hard wicket sloggers it worked a treat

You are so right with this one Mal. Contemporary bowlers aren't bowling anything that hasn't been bowled many times before, it just that a particular bowler may come along with a different technique and turn that ball into a lethal weapon ... some with the assistance of dubious actions but I won't get into that

It's like when Warnie perfected the Flipper. The way the media reacted gave the impression that he invented it. Truth is, leggies have been bowling the flipper since the 1950s, but nobody could bowl it with the length and force that Warnie could.

I still laugh at the vision of all the dismissed English batsmen sitting up above the sightboards with binoculars trying to work out the Warne "mystery". All he was doing was bowling leg spin ... just one hell of a lot better than anyone who came before him.

It also amuses me the way people carry on about "reverse swing" like it's some revolutionary trend. I was bowling it 30 years ago, but back then we'd never heard the term "reverse swing", we just used to make the ball swing in the opposite direction.

Haven't seen Mendis bowl but looking forward to it.

2 points ah, 1950's hey i wonder what tiger o'reilly would think of that & as for 'reverse swing' when i was growing up the fast bowlers bowled 'out swingers' & 'in swingers' i think some cricket journalists/former players like to make up names to justify their position in cricket another one that comes to mind is 'the floating slip'

[Adelaide Hawk]

Well, as far as I know (and I recall Richie Benaud saying this), the flipper was introduced in the late 40s, early 50s by a bowler named Cec Pepper. That was always my belief, but if O'Reilly bowled them as well, then I'm not sure what Benaud was referring to.