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Danish Kaneria: The Maharaja of Mystique |
A Special Feature on Danish Kaneria by
Karthik Narayan
 Mystique
is the charm of a leg spinner, the sheer delight
of bowling balls with the grip of a falcon and
the release of the ball from the wrists, with
subtle variations. This extra special species of
bowlers are in a world of their own. Pakistan
has struggled to have a streamlined spinner in
their team ever since the departure of Saqlain
Mushtaq. Part timers have been donning the job
in an otherwise pace pronged attack. But now,
change is something that comes in where normalcy
fails – in came a chirpy enthusiastic young man
by name Danish Parabha Shanker Kaneria, carrying
with him all hopes and hypes of becoming one of
Pakistan’s greatest leg spinners in the mould of
Abdul Qadir.
Born on December 16, 1980
in Karachi, this right arm leg break bowler had
a great first class career before he was chosen
to play for Pakistan. He made his Test debut
against England at Faisalabad in end-Nov 2000
and that was pure sour grapes for him. While
everyone expected him to have a flying start, he
had a pretty ordinary start to the game. They
had hyped that he would bowl ripping leg
spinners with the flight of an eagle, such
majestic bowling was expected, but he turned out
to be a kiwi – a bowler limited to bowling flat
leggies without much variation. A raw hand, if
that’s the word for it.
But patience pays rich
dividends – as it did for young Kaneria. The
series in Bangladesh against the home side was
the watershed. Wickets poured in like torrential
rain – 34 wickets in 5 tests including his best
ever bowling figures of 7/77 at Dhaka in January
2002. He has 7 five wicket hauls in 22 tests,
and having played against eight test playing
nations, his record of at least one five wicket
haul against 5 of them is not bad by any means.
But then, he has struggled in the very few tests
away from the Asian region; the tour of New
Zealand was nothing to write about. That is an
area he really has to work on, to prolong his
career to the foreign trips ahead and face the
challenge of difficult pitches to bowl on.
His action is not too
flashy; it’s not as smooth as silk as that
yesteryear’s great Abdul Qadir had nor does it
have as much flourish as Mushtaq Ahmed. It looks
rather ungainly and un-smooth if I may use those
words. But in cricket, the end result matters
most, rather than the methods themselves.
Having possessed just his
flat leg spinners, Kaneria worked on his googly,
the main weapon in any leg spinner’s armoury.
And that has made him more lethal than before.
The googly is rather deceptive and since he
keeps the batsman guessing on how much it will
turn and when! The best method to adopt playing
against this leggie is to play off the backfoot
and read the ball after it has pitched. But
then, Kaneria does hurry you up, so better be
awake to read that ball quick!
However, it must be said
that his career has just started, and the heat
is on for a good finish quite some years later.
He is energetic and cheerful on the field and
shows commitment and desire to excel when he
bowls. Kaneria is one of the contemporary
bowlers who relish the challenge of bowling more
overs. He is a relentless bowler and he does not
mind limitless and unending spells of harsh
cricket; a typical slogger who likes to earn his
wickets.
He does go for some runs
en route to picking up wickets, and that was
evident in the manner he got to his first five
wicket haul against Australia and outside
friendly spin wickets, in the Melbourne Test in
January 2005. And now when Pakistan toured
India, his mind bore the fact that no Pakistani
leg spinner has had great success against India
in India. But he has performed exceptionally
well to get 6 scalps in the very first time he
got to bowl in India. A creditable performance
indeed!
He does come across as a
batsman who can stick the bat out for a while,
while whishing and whooshing around the off
stump. He has to work a lot on his batting,
something that shall go against him. One can’t
term him as a reliable tail ender, at least not
till now. But nothing is impossible for the
average human. All that is required is some
workouts, and Kaneria is as good as new to
become a good batsman.
Kaneria carries with him
the reputation of prime spinner for tests, while
his ODI performances are lesser talked about by
the Pakistani Selectors. This promising lad
shall have his delightful days, provided he
works hard and keeps a cool head. The entire
Cricketfundas.com team takes this opportunity to
wish this young man all the best for the future.
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