The 20-year-old leg spinner from Punjab’s Bhatinda, Mayank Markande, has surprised one and all with his superb bowling display in the ongoing Indian Premier League season 2018.
Bought by Mumbai Indians for Rs 20 lakh in the IPL players’ auction held in Bengaluru early January, Markande has taken the IPL 2018 by storm in the first few matches as he has taken as many as seven wickets in two matches.
Following Markande’s superb show so far, experienced Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) spinner Piyush Chawla on April 13 praised MI’s leg-spinner for his variations.
“I have seen him for the first time. I think he is doing very well and I wish him luck,” Chawla told reporters on the sidelines of a promotional event.
Chinaman Kuldeep Yadav, who was also present at the event, opined that spinners with variation are quite handful in the shortest version of the game and are more successful.
“As an off-spinner, if you’re getting turn and you have quite a good variation that really makes a difference in T20 format. That’s why the spinners are very successful in this format,” said Yadav, who is now a regular in the Indian team setup.
Markande, who has got an excellent wrong ‘un, is currently the purple cap holder — given to the bowler with the most number of wickets.
In MI’s first encounter with Chennai Super Kings, the leggie returned with figures of 3/23. He claimed wickets of batsmen like MS Dhoni, Ambati Rayudu and Deepak Chahar.
Also, he bowled superbly against Sunrisers last night as he picked four wickets by leaking just 23 runs.
He might be leaving everyone by surprise with his leg-spin, but not many know that bowling loopy leggies and the right wrong’uns wasn’t his first choice. It was infact – fast bowling.
“I wasn’t too big on playing cricket as a child. I would just go and play for fun and try to bowl fast. Even then, I would bowl the back of the hand delivery – my googly very well,” Markande was quoted by IPLt20.com, as saying.
MI, however, lost their both the battles and they are at No 6 in the ‘Points Table Tally’ with -0.233 Net Run Rate.
Mumbai will face Delhi Daredevils next at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai on 14th April.
