For Akash, the sky is the limit

The Hindu

2 days ago

When Akash Deep received his Test cap from Rahul Dravid on 23 February 2024, it marked the end of one dream. And the beginning of another, more vibrant, more far-reaching, more ambitious – that of bowling India to Test victories.
At Edgbaston on a historic Sunday, that's exactly what the 28-year-old did. He had set things up beautifully on the fourth evening, and even though play began well behind schedule on the final day of the second Test, Akash was neither anxious nor edgy. There was quiet confidence in his abilities, a hunger that comes from having had to wait for his time under the sun, and the desire to make a name for himself, to emerge from the shadows and carve out his own identity.
Willingness to learn
That Akash's 10-wicket match-haul in India's first triumph in nine attempts in Birmingham came on a largely flat and unresponsive track speaks to the hours he has put in honing his craft and the willingness to learn from those who have been there and done that.
A constant attack of the stumps, a line essential in England in the Bazball era of flat pitches, was his greatest ally and he optimised whatever assistance he got late in the game owing to wear and tear. The nip-backer that accounted for Harry Brook on Sunday afternoon after it hit a crack was the perfect example of Akash's propensity to make the most of whatever is available to him, good or otherwise, without complaint or disgruntlement.
Originally from Sasaram in Bihar, he left home for Durgapur as a 14-year-old, in 2010, ostensibly looking for a job. Fortuitously, an uncle of his enrolled him in a cricket academy and he was just beginning to find his bearings when, five years later, his father and then his brother passed away within months of each other.
Saddled with the responsibility of being the lone earning member of his family, Akash was forced to put cricket on the backburner for three years. Then, out of the blue, he made it to the Bengal Under-23 team, followed by a place in the senior state side. After being a net bowler with Royal Challengers Bengaluru (then Bangalore) in 2021, he was bought by the franchise the following season for his base price, ₹20 lakh. That, in the mega auction in Jeddah last November, Lucknow Super Giants eventually shelled out ₹8 crore to enlist his services goes to show the strides he had made in the two years since his maiden IPL foray.
Akash's Test debut – he hasn't represented the country in the two white-ball formats yet – was against England, in Ranchi, which is 300 kilometres from his birthplace. In a way, therefore, it was a homecoming of sorts. The same village where cricket was frowned upon when Akash was rolling his arm over as an early teenager was now agog that one of its own was representing the country in the most visible sport in India. How vindicated the young man must have felt.
Akash had what is lazily conveniently termed a 'dream debut'. It started off in nightmarish fashion, though; barely had he started to celebrate breaching Zak Crawley's defences with his 11th ball in Test cricket when umpire Rod Tucker extended his right arm parallel to the ground upon TV umpire Joel Wilson's advice, indicating that the bowler had overstepped and therefore the wicket didn't count. It must have been a bitter blow but Akash dug deep – pardon the horrible pun – to redeem himself.
In his next over, he dismissed Ben Duckett and Ollie Pope off successive deliveries. The opener was caught behind off a beautiful delivery that nibbled off the seam at the proverbial last second, the right-handed No. 3 was beaten on the inside-edge and adjudged leg before on India's review. Akash wasn't finished yet. With the penultimate ball of his sixth over, he bowled Crawley for the second time in an hour, once again hitting the top of the off-stump after sneaking the in-cutter past the right-hander's inside edge. What drama, what theatre!
Those were to be Akash's only successes in his first Test appearance. India didn't need him to bowl in the second innings with R. Ashwin and Kuldeep Yadav sharing nine wickets. But what a wonderful debut it turned out to be.
History repeats itself
Akash only earned his Test cap because a certain Jasprit Bumrah was rested after playing the first three Tests of that series. Now, a year and a half later, history has repeated itself. His comeback to the Test arena after a back spasm ruled him out of the final Test in Australia in Sydney in January must have stirred a sense of déjà vu because here he was at Edgbaston, playing only because Bumrah was given the game off following his exertions during the five-wicket defeat at Headingley.
Akash could either look at it as a massive and onerous task, stepping into the breach filled by Bumrah's unpluggable absence, or as a huge opportunity to do something for his side. It was no surprise that he went for the latter option. 'I took this as an opportunity,' he reveals. 'If you take pressure, you won't be able to perform. You are playing for the country and there can be no greater privilege than that. I never look at any situation as pressure-filled; I take it as an opportunity and a responsibility.'
Even with Bumrah in their midst, India couldn't stop England from rattling up 371 in the fourth innings in Leeds. 350 of those runs came on the final day, when the champion pacer ended up without a wicket. There were apprehensions in several quarters about what the fate of the Indian bowling would be without Bumrah, about where the wickets would come from.
Fortunately, at least two men didn't share those concerns as they joined hands to prise out all ten wickets between themselves in the English first innings, becoming only the fourth set of Indian opening bowlers to take all 10 opposition wickets and first since Kapil Dev (9/83) and Balwinder Singh Sandhu against West Indies in Ahmedabad in 1983.
Most of the encomiums went the way of Mohammed Siraj, the senior pro who broke an 18-month five-for drought by picking up six for 70, but Akash's contribution wasn't lost on his colleagues, or the coaching group. 'Akash is an attacking bowler that asks questions, bowling at the stumps a lot,' assistant coach Morne Morkel, the former South African pace ace, gushes. 'That's one of the golden rules here in England -- asking questions within the stumps. These sort of conditions in the UK, they suit his style. Coming back from injury and seeing him running in with high pace, it's a nice sign for us.'
Akash provided India with the early impetus in the England first innings on Thursday when he dismissed Duckett and Pope, first-ball, in his second over. Sounds familiar? Duckett, then Pope for a golden duck? Shades of Ranchi, anyone? We did say déjà vu, after all.
He was far from done, though. England counter-punched through Brook and Jamie Smith after slumping to 84 for five, the two right-handers sending India on a leather-hunt by adding 303. As the Duke's lost its newness and its hardness, wicket-taking became practically impossible, staunching the bleeding an onerous task. Shubman Gill was banking on the second new ball, and Siraj and Akash, to snap the alliance and give his team a handy lead. His two pace bowlers didn't disappoint.
Siraj ripped out the tail, cleaning up Brydon Carse, Josh Tongue and Shoaib Bashir for ducks – together, they lasted a mere eight deliveries – but it was Akash who had provided the opening with a wicked, trademark weapon in the third over with the new ball. Like he had done in Ranchi, he produced a signature in-ducker that snaked back a mile, beat a batter on 158 all ends up and pegged his off pole back. It had taken a special ball to end a special innings from Brook, and Siraj drew inspiration from that moment of magic to run through the last three. Akash's four for 88 was numerically inferior to his senior partner's six-wicket haul, but in terms of impact and effect, it was in the same league, at the very least.
But Akash was not yet done. Far from it. Concerns abounded that India hadn't given themselves enough time to bowl England out when they extended their second innings to 427 for six, an overall lead of 607. Had they been too conservative? Were they in such awe of England's attacking prowess that they were willing to court a draw to rule out any chance of defeat? Fear not, the two new-ball bowlers said.
Late on the fourth evening, Siraj drew first blood, ending a forgettable Test for Crawley by having him caught for England's seventh blob of the match. Duckett was enterprising as ever when Akash stepped in, with a ball of indeterminate length – play forward or back was the left-hander's dilemma – that snaked into the off-stump via the inside-edge. But the coup de grace was still a few minutes away.
Illustrating what Morkel said, Akash went wide of the crease and angled a ball in towards Joe Root, England's most accomplished batter. The No. 4 did nothing wrong, playing the line of the ball which – horror, horror – didn't come in on pitching but straightened a touch to curve around his outside edge and rattle timber. It was a ball of the same quality as the one that had evicted Brook in the first innings, right out of the top drawer, reducing a high-class batter to a blubbering wreck. Akash Deep, he sure can bowl.
Akash has made sure that even when Bumrah returns at Lord's, he will keep his place in the XI. The trick for him will be to remain injury-free, to build on the gains of Edgbaston and emerge from this series in a month's time as a more rounded and complete bowler. After that, well, who knows what the limit is.