3 Spinners Who had Fast Bowler’s Mentality: The art of spin bowling is revered as something as much in the mindset as in the physicality of the bowler. A leg-spinner or an off-spinner will get smacked for runs but has to keep on flighting the ball to create a chance for a dismissal.
The aspect of attacking the batter, inviting the big hit, setting him up, bamboozling him – all require an immense amount of thought process in the mind and the skill to then execute it to the tee. The aggressive mentality is something that we often talk about in fast bowlers.
Here are three spinners who are hailed to have the most attacking mindset:
Shane Warne
With Shane Warne, every ball was the theatre. The champions leg-spinner who recently passed away left an unparalleled legacy, reviving and revolutionizing the art of leg-spin and since his debut has been the idol of every budding leg-spinner.
It is often heard about Warne that he never gave up: when the opposition seem to be running away, Warne would motivate himself and his bowlers by envisaging the opposition to lose 3 wickets in the next 30 runs and see where you stand in the game. Warne’s absolute elite psychology as a bowler and a cricketer made him one of the greatest ever to have graced the game.
Anil Kumble
India’s leading international wicket-taker, Anil Kumble, is considered as one of India’s greatest match-winner with the ball in hand. We all know the story when Kumble famously came out to bowl in the 2002 Antigua Test with his face bandaged and bowled with a broken jaw – the frame of mind of a champion who wants to give his all for his team. “At least I can now go home with the thought that I tried my best,” Kumble said of his heroics.
In an era when India didn’t really have the kind of a luxurious fast bowling attack as they do now, it was Anil Kumble who with his admirable mentality, marched the bowling attack and strengthened it.
Ravichandran Ashwin
While some people (read Sanjay Manjrekar) may not consider Ravichandran Ashwin as an “all-time great”, India skipper Rohit Sharma, the man whose opinion matters a lot, couldn’t stop gushing about the “all-time great” off-spinner.
“Whenever we give him the ball, he seems to do something for the team and that’s been happening over the years, not just a couple of series or few years – we have seen him putting up match-winning performances every game that he plays. So in my eyes, definitely, he’s an all-time great,” Sharma said recently.
This mindset, of wanting the ball, of hunting for wickets every time in any situation, willing to turn the game on his own, keeps Ashwin in the fray of being one of the biggest match-winners for India in Tests. He’s India’s second-highest Test wicket-taker now. And that absolutely cream persona, the mindset, the temperament has made Ashwin a champion cricketer.
