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Monday, January 17, 2011

Ishant Sharma


Ishant Sharma (Hindiईशांत शर्माPunjabiਇਸ਼ਾੰਤ ਸ਼ਰਮਾ) (born 2 September 1988, in Delhi, India), is an Indian cricketer. He is a right arm fast bowler at pace around 135 km/h (85mph).
He delivered the second fastest ball ever bowled by an Indian bowler when he clocked 152.6 km/h (94.8 mph) at Adelaide against Australia on 17 February 2008. The fastest one still belongs to Javagal Srinath who clocked 154.5 at the 1999 World Cup.[1]
He has a high arm delivery action and is able to move the ball in both directions.
At the age of 18, Sharma was called to join the Indian squad for the tour of South Africa in 2006-07. However, after receiving the call and organizing travel arrangements, it was decided not to send him on the tour.[2] He has then grabbed all the opportunities that came to his hand and succeeded in both forms of the game. He has earned the nicknameLambu (meaning Tall Guy), which refers to his lean and tall build, measuring 1.93 m (6 ft 4 in)

Domestic and first-class career

Ishant plays for Delhi in domestic cricket and has taken 21 wickets in four first class games, including a five wicket haul against Baroda on the opening day of a match Delhi drew after failing to bowl Baroda out on the fourth day.[4]
Ishant toured England with the India Under-19sin 2006 and Pakistan in 2006–07.
He has played three youth tests and six youth One Day Internationals for India, and is yet to lose a match for them.
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[edit]Rise in international cricket

In May 2007, he was selected in the test team for the Bangladesh tour and played as a replacement for the fast bowler Munaf Patel. Over there he played for his national side in the second test where he bowled 3 overs including one maiden and conceded only five runs without taking a wicket.[5] Later on, he was called for the tour of England in July–August 2007.
Ishant Sharma got a call back in the team in the 3rd Test Match during Pakistan's tour of India in December 2007 due to injury of India's frontline pacers Zaheer Khan, RP Singh, and Sreesanth.[6] On the batting paradise pitch, Sharma toiled hard for cementing and securing his place permanently in the Indian team while picking 5 wickets during the third test in Bangalore.[7] This performance earned him a place in India's squad for the tour of Australia.
Sharma at fielding practice.
Sharma was left out in the Boxing Day Test atMelbourne during the Border-Gavaskar Trophyas India retained their main fast bowlers, Zaheer Khan and RP Singh. However, in January 2008 Sharma was called to represent India once again to replace the injured Zaheer Khan in the second test at the SCG. Sharma started the first day of the match strongly and was involved in a controversial decision from Steve Bucknor when Andrew Symonds nicked the ball to keeper MS Dhoni off his bowling but was given not out. He bowled reasonably in the match, however without much luck.
Although he had little success, the management retained him for the third Test match at Perth. On the fourth day of the match he bowled an exceptional spell to Australian captain Ricky Pontingthat resulted in his wicket and helped India claim victory.[8] He used the pace and bounce of theWACA wicket to trouble the batsmen. In the following test played in Adelaide he picked up two wickets and impressed everyone with his bowling. He didn't bowl above 140–145 km/h mark in thetest matches so that he could bowl longer spells as needed in this version of the game. He clocked a highest of 147.7 km/h(91.1 mph) at the Adelaide test his highest till then.
On February 10, 2008, Sharma bagged four important wickets in the 4th ODI of CB Series against Australia. He ended up with the figures of 4/38 and claimed the man of the match award.[9] He scalped two important wickets on February 18, 2008 versus Australia in the 7th ODI of CB series.[10]

[edit]Achievements and abilities

Ishant Sharma has been focusing on becoming a Fast bowler rather than Medium Pacer. He bowled a 149.5 km/h (92.9 mph) delivery versus Australia in Melbourne on February 10, 2008. At that time he was just 0.2 km/h short of fastest ball ever bowled by Indian. The record holder was Ashish Nehra who bowled at 149.7 km/h (93.0 mph) versus Zimbabwe at World Cup 2003. However, Ishant was successful in breaking the record just a week after he got close to it, versus Australia in Melbourne on February 17, 2008. His fastest ball was 153.0 km/h (95.1 mph) and he constantly clocked around that 152 km/h mark.[11]
Sharma has a high-arm action attacking on and around the batsman's off-stump (the corridor of uncertainty) which gives him the ability to nip the ball back in to right-handed batsman and also swing it through the air quite considerably, while extracting a great deal of bounce. Some critics have compared him to the 1980s' West Indian fast bowlers, especially the legendary Curtly Ambrose. He has also been compared to the Indian Fast bowler Javagal Srinath. Under the tutelage of Indian bowling coach Venkatesh Prasad, Ishant has learnt the difficult art ofreverse swing which he put in to use to trouble the visiting Australians in 2008.[12]
Ishant Sharma was the discovery of the tour Down Under. He troubled some of the best Australian batsmen with his bowling. This led Australian skipper Ricky Ponting to admit that Ishant Sharma is dangerous.[13] On the basis of his recent strong performance in Australia, Ishant Sharma was lapped up for an astounding winning bid of $950,000 by Bollywood superstar Shahrukh Khan for his franchise Kolkata Knight Riders in the player auction for the IPL twenty20.This was the highest amount paid for any bowler in IPL tournament.
During the 2008 Test series against Australia in India, Ishant was the leading wicket-taker, with 15, and was named man-of-the-series as India won 2–0. He thereby became the first Indian paceman to win such an award in a Test series on Indian soil after Kapil Dev who won the award in 1983. He was noted for achieving reverse swing on balls sometimes as young as eight overs, and along with senior opening bowlerZaheer Khan, troubled the touring Australians.[14] He took Australian captain Ricky Ponting's wicket three times during the series, and six times in as many Tests, making the Indian press label Ponting as Ishant's bunny[15]
However, in 2009, Ishant's form slumped, and he was dropped for the Second Test against Sri Lanka, replaced by Sreesanth.



On October 5, 2010, Ishant helped VVS Laxman pull off a highly unlikely win over Australia by one wicket in the First Test in Mohali after India had fallen to 8/124 in pursuit of 205. Ishant provided Laxman with support during a 81-run partnership in which he contributed 31 valuable runs. Laxman eventually guided India to a tense win.

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