Ponting’s advice, Siraj’s trick help Arshdeep rediscover rhythm

MUMBAI : “Going back to the basics,” may be the most cliched line delivered by a player but when the mind is muddled, it is often the most effective remedy. Arshdeep Singh also went down that road, found his answers and delivered a Player-of-the-Match performance in Punjab Kings’ seven-wicket win over Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede Stadium on Thursday.

The 27-year-old came into the MI match short on confidence and with his line and length all over the place. He had taken just two wickets in four matches and in the Powerplay, he had gone wicketless in 10 games stretching back to last season.

But against MI, the outswinger was back while the tailing yorkers were on the money. Arshdeep finished with 3/22 from four overs, accounting for Ryan Rickelton, Suryakumar Yadav and Sherfane Rutherford and became the 31st bowler to cross 100 IPL -wickets.

In his second over, he revealed his new variation, a scrambled seam delivery that tailed in, and Rickelton, cramped for room, hit it to backward square leg. The very next ball, a classic outswinger caught Surya off guard as he edged it to short third man. The left-arm pacer returned in the death overs to land a perfect yorker to rattle Rutherford’s stumps, reminding everyone that his full repertoire remains intact.

In the previous four matches, Arshdeep had conceded 16 wides, which mostly came in bunches in his endeavour to stay away from batters’ arc. Against MI, though, the accuracy was back as he bowled just one wide. Later, Arshdeep attributed his effort to clearing the clutter to a pep talk from coach Ricky Ponting.

“I told Ricky that the ball is not coming out of my hand well. He just told me to keep myself fresh mentally and not expect too much out of myself and just go with the flow,” he said.

“He said, ‘You’re coming off a high winning a World Cup and it’s not easy to maintain that high all the time. So you’ve just got to stick to the basics and have fun. That’s the most important part of the game. Just enjoy it and stick to your basics,’” he added.

The Rickelton wicket came from a scrambled seam delivery, which he has been working on after seeing the success India teammate Mohammed Siraj achieved with it. “That is the ball I’ve been trying to work on. Siraj got a lot of wickets with the scrambled seam. It’s still not there yet, but I’m trying to learn it as much as I can as a variation. I just wanted to change it a bit,” Arshdeep explained.

PBKS’s spin-bowling coach Sairaj Bahutule explained how hard Arshdeep worked in the nets to regain his groove and confidence. “You encounter different conditions at different venues and expectations are high. Sometimes you forget to bowl your stock ball. But he’s very self-aware, went back to his basics, did a lot of spot bowling and came back with the understanding that he must focus on what he does best. And that’s what he did in this game,” said Bahutule.