Wasim Akram’s advice to bowl inswingers helped me against India, Junaid Khan reveals

Left-arm pacer Junaid Khan has disclosed that Wasim Akram’s advice to bowl inswinging deliveries to the Indian batsmen helped him greatly in the just-concluded One Day International (ODI) series in India.

Junaid was among the most successful and impressive players in the three-match series. He made life very tricky for the Men in Blue, and scalped eight wickets in three matches.

After enjoying a successful journey, he revealed that as a left-arm he used to rely heavily on outswinders, but the former captain advised him to bring the ball in to be successful against the Indians.

"I have been a bowler who has relied on bowling outswingers consistently at a good pace. It was Wasim bhai (Akram) who told me to develop the incoming delivery which would be my weapon against the Indian right-handers," the 23-year-old Junaid told PTI during
an interaction before leaving for Lahore on Monday.

"It’s very natural for left-arm fast bowlers to slant it across the right-handers. Once a guy like Virender Sehwag gauges the length of the away-going deliveries, you can be murdered."

"When I did my homework, I found out that Sehwag has a problem with the ball that comes in. I then started working hard on that incoming delivery with our chief bowling coach Mohammed Akram.”

In three encounters, Junaid picked up the crucial wickets of Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir and Yuvraj Singh once, and making Virat Kohli his ‘bunny’ he dismissed him on all three occasions.

"I was never under any kind of pressure to perform. I also got a lot of back-up from the other end as Mohammed Irfan and Umar Gul also bowled superbly. It was certainly a collective effort," added the young pacer, who has played 16 ODIs and eight Tests matches.

He explained that he would not compromise on his pace, despite adding that swing bowling is the most important thing to be on top in the modern-day cricket.

He further described that the batsmen usually get adjusted to the pace, but if an individual has the ability to swing the ball both ways, he becomes very dangerous.

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Posted by Rana Nasir Ghafoor on Jan 7 2013. Filed under Pakistan, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry