Cricket is a game where there is a keen contest between bat and ball. When a batsmen turns aggresive or bowler chops through the batting order we simply put in in one word "Brutal". Leaving aside batsmen, the modern day bowlers like Bret Lee, Lasith Malinga, Ishanth sharma, shoaib akhtar, kemar roach, dayle steyn can easily bowl @ 150kmph speed. when they bowl at such speed, it is the turn of batsmen to just see balls whispering past them or their wickets going for a walk across the ground. The modern greats have been well trained with good fitness levels. If we call this kind of bowling deadly, on the other side there are other deadly bowlers who are just use their wrists and fingers to turn the ball all across the pitch. Sometimes these bowlers seems to be more deadly than pace bowlers and when these bowlers are in their best form there is no other option for the batsmen other than packing their bags. Some legends and present generation players include Muralitharan, kumble, Vettori, Ajmal, swann, saqlain, Ashwin, shane warne and others.
considering all this, if we take history, all the sub-continent countries have been forts for spin bowling and there is very rare talent in fast bowling. In contrast, Australia, england, south africa pitches are bouncy and tend to support fast bowlers. So, it is natural that they teand to have better fast bowlers than what sub-continent contries have. Take the case of west-indies where there were no quality spinners previously and the whole team used to depend on their quality fast bowlers.The deadly combo of holading, garner, roberts of 70's and 80's was the best exmaple. everyone knows whose called the whispering death of cricket. when we started watching cricket we saw likes of Ambrose and Walsh. i still remember that QUARTEL FINAL clash of west-indies and south africa in 1996 world cup where gary kirsten was out hit wicket unable to bare the bouncer of Ambrose. there were such quality resources in that team at that time. But when Ambrose and walsh retired that was the end of it. There were no more such deadly bowlers emerging from west indies and they started depending more on spinners. Can't underestimate Fidel edwards, tino best and Kemer roach, but they are well below par compared to some other greats. Just seeing the preliminary 30-man squad for twenty20 world cup 2012 people will be surprised at the spin strength of west indies. ofcourse twenty20 world cup being played on lankan pitches this is expected.The present squad includes Sunil Narine, Bishoo, Smauel badree, bennshillinford and 3 more.
We all know how sunil narine performed in IPL and recently concluded NZ ODI series. Bishoo has always been there. Before these two Benn has been leading. they anyway have samuels and gayle who can turn their hands at critical times. Even chanderpaul and sarwan can bowl too. Watching all these we can surely say that west indies cricket which is known for their deadly fast bowlers in the past is becoming a spin dominated team. hope we can see more quality bowlers in future taking inspiration from these emerging stars. Also lets hope Narine doesn't become another Ajantha Mendis.
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