Sunrisers Hyderabad’s (SRH) young pacer from Jammu and Kashmir Umran Malik is hogging all the limelight in the ongoing IPL 2022, thanks to his ability to constantly bowl at a searing pace, and former India opener Sunil Gavaskar feels that he is ready to step up to the next level and play for India.
Malik, who was discovered by SRH in IPL 2021 and added to the squad as an injury replacement, has been dishing out deliveries over 150 kph with alarming regularities and in SRH’s last match against Punjab Kings, became the 4th bowler in IPL history to bowl a wicket-maiden 20th over in an innings.
"Umran Malik has been very, very impressive with his speed but more than his speed, it's his accuracy (that's impressed). A lot of guys who bowl at that speed tend to spray the ball around but Umran bowls very few wide deliveries," said Gavaskar on Cricket Live on Star Sports.
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"If he can control the wides down the leg side, he will be a tremendous bowler because that will mean he'll be attacking the stumps all the time, and with his pace, it's not easy to hit straight. If he bowls wicket-to-wicket, he's going to be pretty much an unplayable bowler. He's going to play for India," he stated further.
Much of the controlled aggression showed by Malik this season has been attributed to SRH pace bowling coach Dale Steyn. The South African bowling great was also highly impressed by Umran and was seen celebrating enthusiastically when Malik castled the KKR captain Shreyas Iyer with a searing yorker in SRH’s match against Kolkata Knight Riders.
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While speaking on Cricket Live on Star Sports, Steyn said on Umran: "My job with Umran is to ensure he runs fast and make players play differently. My job is to try and make him forward-thinking as to what the batters are planning on doing. It's exciting for us to sit back and watch what a genius he is. I don't want to turn him into what I was, all I want is his geniuses to come out."
SRH will next square off against Royal Challengers Bangalore on Saturday.
