Five-time Indian Premier League (IPL) champions Mumbai Indians are known to unearth some serious talents and this year two names have come to the fore- Nehal Wadhera and Akash Madhhwal. While one (Wadhera) is a promising middle-order batter, Madhwal has shown what he can do with the ball in hand. The right-arm pacer ran through Lucknow Super Giants’ middle order in the IPL 2023 Eliminator.
Madhwal claimed the best-ever bowling figures by a bowler (5/5) in the history of IPL knockouts. Not just in this game, Madhwal had put on an emphatic performance in the game prior to this as well. The MI pacer had bagged four wickets against Sunrisers Hyderabad in a must-win game for MI.
Overall, Madhwal has scalped 13 wickets in 7 outings so far at an average of 12.85 and an economy rate of 7.77. But is this a fortnight success for Madhwal? Surely not. The Uttarakhand-born cricketer has had his share of struggles, a summary of which the pacer gave after his match-winning spell against Lucknow. “I have done engineering, cricket is my passion and I have been waiting for this since 2018,” told Madhwal at the post-match presentation.
Uttarakhand coaches narrate Akash Madhwal’s success story
Now, Wasim Jaffer who has worked with Madhwal as a coach, has revealed how the rookie pacer with no experience with season ball cricket impressed everyone with his raw pace and talent.
“When I was Uttarakhand Head Coach this boy came for trials. He was 24-25 and had only played tennis ball cricket. We were so impressed with his pace we roped him in right away! The year was 2019, and that boy was Akash Madhwal. Proud of how far he’s come! #MIvsLSG #IPL2023,” wrote Jaffer on Twitter after MI qualified for the IPL 2023 Qualifier 2.
The current head coach of Uttarakhand echoed Jaffer’s words as he revealed how Madhwal worked on his bowling and became what a bowler he is today.
“Since he played a lot of tennis ball cricket, the pace was there but it was accuracy that he was lacking. He used to experiment a lot with his bowling. My only concern was, if you can bowl quick and straight, why are you going for the slower one. Slowly he got what we were trying to tell him, and you can see the result,” said Manish Jha to The Indian Express.
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