Current Indian openers are not like Sehwag Says Dale Steyn
NEW DELHI: Dale Steyn has given nightmares to batsmen the world over. On Tuesday, he admitted that he was relieved that for the first time in his career he would not be bowling to the likes of either Sachin Tendulkar or Virender Sehwag while touring India.
Tendulkar first played Test cricket in India in November 1990, 25 years ago. So, it would be India’s first home Test series without Tendulkar since November 1988 when India take on South Africa here at the IS Bindra Stadium here from Thursday.
Steyn took a swipe at Indian batting line up by suggesting that the men who’ve replaced Tendulkar and Sehwag in the Indian team are easy meat, relatively.
“In the past when I have played here, I have bowled against guys like Virender Sehwag, that guy was a nightmare,” Steyn said. “He scored 300 in Chennai and if you missed him by that much (gesture with hand), he would smoke you.”
Known for his hostile bowling, Steyn feels that current Indian batting line-up now is “slightly different”.”The two opening batters kind of let you bowl to them a little bit more,” he said. “When they’re in form, they’re really difficult to bowl to… But they’re not like Sehwag, who’d blaze from ball one.”
Steyn has taken 25 wickets at an average of 20.23 in five Tests that he has played in India, which can be termed as good for a fast bowler on Indian pitches. It was his bowling efforts that Proteas won two of those five Tests and lost two, while one was drawn.
In fact, Steyn was unplayable in the two wins, he took 18 wickets at an average of 12.33. This has even been better than his average in home Tests, 15.86.
And it was his poor bowling average of 50.25 on rank turners that was the main reason for visitors losing two Tests in India. In Kanpur and Kolkata, India turned the tables on Proteas by rolling out typical turners to came from behind both times to draw series.
Steyn could only take three wickets in the two defeats, with a strike rate of one wicket in 13 overs.
Keeping in mind that India rolled out turners during those two occasions in complete desperation, Steyn expects wickets for two of three Tests to be turners after what has happened in T20 and ODI series already.
But his own bad numbers in those two defeats in India are not bothering him too much. He very well knows that guys who caused those bad numbers, Sehwag and Tendulkar, are no longer there to bother him or his fellow pacers.
“We do a lot of homework – who we are playing against and where players get out, especially their last 10 innings. We look at how have they got out and if there is a pattern,” said Steyn.
“It’s about getting into his head a little bit. Maybe looking at his last 10 dismissals and if there has been an area where he has got out, maybe caught short mid-wicket, putting a guy there and making him aware of that, like ‘I am going to put the guy there and I am going to tell you about it and if you get out to him, I am going to laugh at you too’,” added the Protean speedster.
However, one thing which could bother Indian batsmen in the coming four-Test series is that Steyn enjoys running on Indian flat grounds. “I love bowling in India because the grounds are quite flat, so you almost feel like you are running downhill all day long,” he compared flat Indian grounds with those uphill run in the middle back home.
When asked what it takes for overseas fast bowlers to do well on Indian flat tracks, Steyn replied: “I think pace through the air is really important. It’s the guys that bowl 145 kph-plus that really rush batters because it gives them a lot less time to be able to adjust when the ball is reversing or there is a bit of something off the deck. But control is another thing. You have to land the ball in the right area.”
