It's been almost a year since the July 6, 2008 Asia Cup final between India and Sri Lanka in Karachi. A certain Ajantha Mendis spun
his way 'mysteriously' into our collective consciousness with a spell of 6 for 13 in 8 overs to bowl Sri Lanka to a 100-run victory. He also had 17 wickets in the tournament from five games, winning him the Man of the Series award.
A couple of weeks later, he terrorised India's batsmen, including the fabled 'Fab Four', to grab 26 wickets in a three-match Test series in Lanka. He won the Man of the Series award again. The word 'mystery spinner' and 'carrom ball' became as much a part of cricket vocabulary as 'mid-on' and 'mid-off'. Batsmen were wary of facing him, at least in Sri Lanka or the subcontinent.
While conditions in England have been different from Sri Lanka, Mendis, a gunman in the Sri Lankan army, has managed to have the same effect on rival teams, shooting down batsmen in the World T20. His Man-of-the-Match winning effort of 3/9 in three overs against New Zealand at Trent Bridge enabled Sri Lanka to enter the semifinals as Group F toppers.
Mendis now has 10 wickets from five games and is fourth on the wicket-takers' list behind Umar Gul (12 wkts), Saeed Ajmal (11 wkts) and teammate Lasith Malinga (11). And he has done it by bowling straight and getting his victims either bowled or leg-before.
New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori conceded after the game that getting after him was difficult. "Ross Taylor tried to get after him and target the short boundaries, but couldn't. You just have to admire the quality of bowling that was on view. Mendis bowled exceptionally well today," he said.
Normally, rival spin bowlers find it hard to find praiseworthy words for other spinners. Not Vettori, though. "It's no use blaming the batsmen for not doing the job. A lot of our batsmen picked Mendis today, but we found it very difficult to score off him. We all saw the turn that he got and that made it even harder for us to score off him."
The left-arm-spinner also refused to tag him as a mystery spinner. "He is not a mystery bowler. He is just a very good bowler with exceptional skill."
Before the start of the tournament, Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara had mentioned how it was important for Mendis to keep evolving and increasing his variations, as batsmen would soon figure him out. One year into the job as a mystery bowler, does Mendis feel that batsmen are figuring him out?
Mahela Jayawardene, who acted as interpreter for Mendis, said, "Even if the batsmen pick him, they find it difficult to score off him as he bowls very straight. (That's partly why he gets so many leg-before and bowled dismissals)."
What about the rest of the batsmen in the Sri Lankan batting line-up? "We do pick up, but he has got a lot of tricks in his trade. He does so many things with his fingers that it's difficult to keep track of things," Mahela, an expert in playing spin bowling, admitted. He also praised the role of Muralitharan in Mendis' rise.
Mendis is one of the many freakish talents that Sri Lankan cricket has produced. Be it Muttiah Muralitharan, Lasith Malinga, Sanath Jayasuriya and Ajantha Mendis, all of them are exceptionally successful playing cricket in an unorthodox manner. Mahela credits that to the amount of craze there is for cricket in Sri Lanka.
"Everyone wants to pick up a bat or a ball and imitate a Jayasuriya or a Murali. They are such good role models," Jayawardene said. With so much video analysis and team meetings, one is amazed that Mendis' enigma has still not been unravelled. Surely, the man himself enjoys the tag of being a 'mystery' bowler.
Source : TOI
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