With his ferocity and tenacity, supporting actor Hardik Pandya makes a strong impression

With his ferocity and tenacity, supporting actor Hardik Pandya makes a strong impression

He delivered a blistering spell with Sri Lanka edging closer to victory, and every ball appeared to have the batter’s name on it.

It was one of those games where the final score might not fully reflect the contribution that Hardik Pandya made with the ball to the outcome. His statistics read 5-0-14-1, which, although impressive, were not quite the blockbuster performances you saw from left-arm spinners Dunith Wellalage (5-40) and Kuldeep Yadav (4-43), both of whom are 20 years old.

On a surface where the ball was gripping, turning square, occasionally maintaining a little low, and generally playing up and down enough to put hitters between the devil and the deep blue sea, they yet made an enduring impression on India’s valiant defense of 214. When India recovered after three rapid blows, KL Rahul and Ishan Kishan put on an excellent display of batting against spin during their 63-run stand. At one point, they thought that prudence and patience were the order of the day.

Second, you couldn’t help but believe that it’s important to try to play your shots before a ball has your name on it when you see spinners come on and challenge both edges of the bat, as Wellalage did by just staying to a wicket-to-wicket line and varied his flight and angles. Watching how hitters from both sides handled this conundrum was fascinating. And it was in the midst of this that Hardik really distinguished himself with his ferocity and intensity—a compliment that, in the past, had primarily been reserved for his batting and, to a significant part, his captaincy.

It’s no secret that India has been waiting for Hardik to bowl in this way for a while and has tried everything to achieve it, even wrapping him in cotton wool for this purpose. As you witnessed on Tuesday when India fielded Axar Patel in addition to Kuldeep and Ravindra Jadeja as a third specialist spinner, this undoubtedly gives India flexibility in the selection process. Although the conditions did favor spin, India is in a position to consider flexibility and batting depth and have Hardik play the role of a third seamer rather than a bits-and-pieces bowler who can only keep an end up.

When it appeared for a time as though India was just running out of gas when Dhananjaya de Silva and Wellalage threatened a jailbreak, Hardik’s intensity truly helped India. It’s not complicated, but on these roaring turners, the ones that don’t turn are almost always more dangerous. However, these pitches have a tendency to overexcite spinners, as it appeared to be with Jadeja and Axar for a while.

At this point, Hardik came in and delivered a furious spell in which each ball appeared to have the batter’s name on it. He did it all with a charming smirk that indicated he knew he was in top gear: hard lengths, nip off the pitch, bounce, landing it with an upright seam to have the batsman nicking. All of these combinations were combined with lethal precision. He regularly hit 140 kph, hit the ball high off the bat, and had the lower order dancing to his beat.

When Hardik eventually took his first wicket, the eighth of the innings, with Maheesh Theekshana slicing one to a diving Suryakumar Yadav at mid-on, Rohit Sharma, who was just starting to lose patience, was finally able to afford a smirk that developed into full-blown laughter. Sri Lanka suddenly had two wickets in hand and needed to score 43 off of 55.

With Dhananjaya and Wellalage at the crease and Sri Lanka needing 62 runs from 16 overs, Hardik had just started the stint. So it’s not like he was handed it to him for free. But by swiftly assessing the situation and bowling a telling spell that gently chipped away at the batters—rather than launching thunderbolts at them—he gave them a decent work over and eventually convinced them that taking a modest risk against the spinners was worthwhile. When Dhananjaya attempted to strike Jadeja against the turn but was stopped at mid-on, this ultimately proved to be his downfall. After four overs, the contest was all but over.

Hardik’s performance was one of those where the supporting actor received just as much praise as the lead, who is typically the one who pulls off the big-budget productions. Jasprit Bumrah and Kuldeep Yadav, who were at the forefront of yet another amazing performance to go along with their effect against Pakistan 24 hours before, were those heroes for India. But Hardik couldn’t be disregarded. He quickly transitioned from being a tortoise to a hare, a state he didn’t even leave until the end of July.

The situation for him as well as India couldn’t have been better with the World Cup less than a month away.