T&T and West Indies off-spinner Sunil Narine is not giving up so easily as far as his career in the Indian Premier League (IPL) is concerned. The mystery spinner was told by the Board of Control for Cricket in India that he cannot bowl his stock delivery, the “off-spinner” in any cricket match organised by them.
Narine, on the advise of officials at the Kolkata Knight Riders team, decided to re-take the test yesterday in Chennai at the ICC-accredited Sri Ramachandra Arthroscopy and Sports Sciences Centre. After a fair amount of his deliveries were reported by the match officials during Knight Riders’ away match against Sunrisers Hyderabad on April 22, Narine underwent testing last weekend.
The tests revealed that Narine had a flex in his elbow while delivering the offspin delivery. Consequently, the BCCI, while allowing Narine to play in the IPL, made it clear that he could not bowl his stock ball. Among other deliveries that were tested and cleared were his knuckle ball and straighter delivery.
A source close to the Arima man told the T&T Guardian: “Sunil did another test and he is confident that he will get the all clear in a few days time. He felt good bowling the off-spinner during the tests in South India and is looking forward to getting back into action with his full repertoire of deliveries available at his disposal.
“He has shown tremendous strength during this ordeal and will get past this. He just needs to understand that there is something called ‘muscle memory’ so it is easier for him to slip back into his old action. He needs to focus deeply on his bowling and with repeated practice he would be able to adapt nicely to the new action. Despite what he is going through, his career is far from over, he is too strong of a character to give is easily.”
Narine did not play in yesterday’s win by the KKR over the powerful Chennai Super Kings. Instead his countryman Andre Russell scored a half century to take the KKR to an easy win.
