::: Star Weekend Magazine :::

Murali On His
Own with 800

Mohammad Isam

Cricket, for players, coaches, writers, officials, aficionados and for the average fan, is a true reflection of life.

The nature of the sport is to always, no matter what, reach a full circle. Yes, luck plays a huge part in every sport but for those who grew up playing and watching cricket, at any level, know that in this game, what goes around always comes around.

When Daryl Hair raised his arm to no-ball Muttiah Muralidaran in 1995 or when Ross Emerson did the same three years later in Adelaide, and the subsequent biometrics tests were run on him, one would have been tempted to make a prediction. Of course I didn't, and neither did anyone I know. If someone were to rise from this mess, he would truly become a legend. And he did.

But Muralidaran split opinions. Some called him a chucker, some called the umpires racists, old hags who didn't want someone from a tiny island to do well.

He is proof of astonishing skill for some and evidence of rules being conveniently bent for others; he is a champion yet he is a cheat. Argument over him is unending, it is alive with bias (both ways). And both schools of thought on him could be deemed tolerable, if not legitimate.

Yet, all this doubt and petty opinions (from even those in favour of him) never stopped the son of a confectioner (fittingly from a town called Kandy), who is beyond reach of the greatest of greats.

Last Thursday, an anxious crowd in Galle, the tsunami-ravaged town, saw their favourite son reach untouchable levels of greatness, like the Australian man who famously visited Ceylon in 1948.

In 62 years, no batsman has been able to deliver like the Don (Bradman) had in the early part of the 20th century. We don't need a reminder of his exploits but just for the sake of proving a point, the average was 99.94 in 52 Test matches with 29 centuries of which two were triple hundreds.

In all these years, hardly anyone has measured up to that man in terms of sheer numbers, although Sachin Tendulkar has had a lot to say about that. But the genius from Mumbai would be accepting the fact that though he broke the Don's record of centuries and runs, the average remains intact and this is where Murali comes in.

The off-spinner's 800 Test wickets is unparalleled. No one from this generation would be able to break this record and with the rapid pace with which the game is stacking up against the bowlers, the record looks to be intact for a century perhaps.

Probably when Bradman had set all those records, everyone wrote and thought in this line until Tendulkar came up.

But again, I'm comparing two accomplishments that I think will never be touched, let alone broken, even by a spinner.

Maybe someone like Muralidaran's teammate Ajantha Mendis will have a go, but technology and the bulk of cricket that his shoulder and fingers have to endure will have a major say in his quest.

Muralidaran, too, didn't play in simple times. He was probably the most video-taped and tested of all cricketers in history. He spent months at the University of Western Australia in Perth, with wires attached to his joints. Finally the fact that every bowler has a 10-degree bend in his or her bowling arm was the clincher.

When you look at his career, you sense something strange. It took the man five years to reach 100 Test wickets, a bit like Tendulkar needing the same amount of time to make his first one-day hundred. Maybe the geniuses like to take it one step at a time.

Having found his groove from the 1996 World Cup, Murali slowly transformed himself into a bowler who read batsmen quickly and judged conditions and pitches to perfection.

These were his strengths; he was a hands-on judge of situations and knew when to unleash the doosra (Murali brought out his 'other one' much later than Saqlain Mushtaq and Harbhajan Singh).

Murali got better and better as the Nineties made way for the Noughties. 2000, 2001 and 2006 were his most productive years and England became his favourite opponent.

But the doubters, including Shane Warne, pointed out his nearly 200 wickets against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. To this day, Bishan Singh Bedi kept calling him a 'javelin thrower' and referred to his wickets as run-outs.

But because he is the man of destiny in cricket, Murali probably knew every storm passes off and brings sunshine. Plus it helps when you have 800 Test wickets, the next barbed comment matters less.

The little man won his final battle and is perched on top of all bowlers and just like the Don, will be lonely at that spot for a very long time; maybe another true hero, who breaks barriers and doesn't look the part, can reach 801.