When the players of Australia and India were standing at the SCG during the national anthems of both the countries, camera frames were frozen on the face of Mohammed Siraj whose tears were not stopping and were flowing on his cheeks. The moment was indeed special for Siraj who was living through the dreams he and his father had seen when his father used to ride an auto rickshaw in Hyderabad.
Former cricketers and analysts swapped in to point out how much the game and representing his country meant for the right-arm pacer, although he is not lucky enough to make his father realise his dreams, and that he can only see him looking up in the sky after taking every wicket in the first few days of career.
He was India's man to answer the press conference after the end of the first day’s play, and Siraj was asked to touch upon the feelings that made the moment so emotional for him. "Just remembered my father at that time. I was really emotional. He wanted me to see playing Test cricket. Wish he could see me playing for India,” was the reply of the young man who has shown exemplary mental strength by staying back in Australia to live up to his father's expectations while dealing with a possible emotional capitulation.
Siraj is having an interesting entry into Test cricket as he has been promoted as one of the lead bowlers just in the second game of career, after being held back with the ball by the captain on his debut. Siraj showed more skills and temperament for a bowler playing his first game at the MCG, and with the injury to Umesh Yadav, the team management had no option but to promote Siraj with the new ball alongside Jasprit Bumrah.
Just like his Test debut where he seized the opportunity with both hands, Siraj put all his emotions he felt before the game behind him, to get into the basics on how to bowl with the new ball. He knew the incoming David Warner was itching to get away with few boundaries at the start of his innings, and kept his composure and kept on teasing the left-hander outside his off stump.
The persistence paid off as Warner edged one to Cheteshwar Pujara while attempting to drive Siraj on the up and the Indian team was delighted to see a young man making the most of chances and rising to the occasion, but for Siraj, the ball was left to do the talking as he celebrated by putting his finger on his lips.
He was disciplined with the ball and kept on testing the debutant Will Pucovski outside his off stump, and sometimes bringing the ball back in hope of hitting his pad as the right-hander showed a vulnerability in taking a front foot stride across the line of the stumps. Moreover, he was smart enough to remember the struggles of Pucovski in the recent past where he has struggled to get his head out of the line, and hence target him with a sharp and accurate bouncer in a well-laid plan.
“Last match (the practice match) we were bowling short to him and in this game also we tried that as he was playing them and not leaving. So, the plan was to surprise him with an odd bouncer without shifting focus on line and length,” Siraj said of the line of attack against Pucovski.
Siraj’s accuracy and perseverance almost paid off when the debutant top-edged one in an attempt of pulling one rising bouncer off him, but it was not to be for India and Siraj as Rishabh Pant dropped yet another chance in the horrible hour of play for him and the tourists. Pant attempted to catch the ball in the second grab and although the umpires went upstairs to confirm the legality of the catch, Siraj was elated and hugged Pant twice in a sign of how much that wicket meant to him. Ultimately, it turned out Rishabh Pant had let the ball go between his pair of gloves, but at the end of fay, Siraj looked at the dropped catch as a ‘part of the game,’ and pointed out regaining focus back as the key to move on from such episodes.
"It is part of the game and you do get upset as a bowler when it happens. But it is something we can't do much about...It becomes important to move on and focus on the next over,” Siraj said of the dropped chances by Rishabh Pant.
Before the second Test at the MCG, there was a direct toss-up between Navdeep Saini and Siraj as the third seamer to replace Mohammed Shami. Ultimately;y, the team management went for Siraj because of him showing excellent rhythm in the two warm-up games, while his competitor Navdeep Saini looked all over the place in the tour games.
The chance to debut did not come too late for Saini either as Umesh Yadav got ruled out of the series, and the right arm pacer from Karnal started his Test career on a horrible note, giving away two boundaries off his first two deliveries in his Test career. Saini looked under enormous pressure, but Siraj came running in for him to boost the confidence of someone Siraj believes bonds well with him and made him realise that he has to do nothing extra in the big state of a Test match.
He made Saini realise that replicating just what he has been doing over the years in the domestic cricket and for India A where Siraj and he have been playing together for a long time, would bring him rewards, and it came quickly in the form of Pucovski wicket who was caught inside the crease and in front of the stumps to hand Sanii his maiden Test wicket.
"Saini and I have played a lot of matches together for India A, so we bond really well. I was just telling him to do what we did in domestic cricket and India A,” Siraj said on the bond between him and Saini.
Experts and analysts present at the ground observed that the pitch at the SCG was the best pitch to bat on compared to the last two pitches at the MCG and the Adelaide Oval. The bounce was true on the wicket, which was on the lower side, and it provided the home batsmen extra time to adjust against whatever little movement the India bowlers were able to extract in the air or off the pitch.
However, the pacer emphasized the value of patience in Test cricket and said that the Indian bowlers are looking forward to building more pressure by bowling tighter lines and length to the Australian batsmen on the day two of the Test.
"It is very a flat wicket. Our plan was to build pressure and not try too much as it is a very easy wicket for the batsman. Even the bouncers are not carrying as well it was in the earlier games," said Siraj, who made his debut in the previous game. But Test cricket it is all about patience and we must keep that in mind,” Siraj said on the pitch at SCG.
Siraj echoed the sentiment of a flat pitch and pointed that their bouncers too did not carry high enough to trouble batsmen, and that slowness of the wicket allowed the batsmen to use their feet and hit over the top against spinners.
“It is because of the easy nature of the surface that their batsmen stepped out but when they saw the ball turning sharply late in the day, they went back to the crease," Siraj observed. Let's see what happens tomorrow. The plan is to bowl in one tight channel and build pressure,” Siraj added.
Australia are in a much better situation in the Test match after poor display of batting in all the four innings preceding the first innings at the SCG with the unbeaten pair of Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne looking in ominous touch for the tourists. Siraj will once again be relied upon by Ajinkya Rahane in the first spell of the second day to find a breakthrough, and if he will be able to take away even one of Smith and Labuschagne before they can harm India, the ascendency of Siraj in the team will be well and truly begin if it had already not started on his debut at the MCG in the Boxing day Test.
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