Former Australian wicket-keeper bat Brad Haddin heaped praise on Mohammed Siraj for his hunger to deliver in pressure moments after India’s six-run win against England at the Kennington Oval, London. Siraj returned with figures of 5-104 in the second innings of the fifth Test to help India register a historic win.
On the final day’s play, Siraj accounted for Jamie Smith, Jamie Overton and Gus Atkinson. With England needing only seven runs to win, Siraj yorked Atkinson with a perfect delivery and delivered the goods for the visitors.
Siraj had also picked four wickets in the first innings and had dismissed Joe Root, Ollie Pope, Harry Brook, and Jacob Bethell. The fast bowler from Hyderabad scalped 23 wickets in five Test matches against England at an average of 32.43.
Brad Haddin said on the LiSTNR YouTube Channel, “I think Siraj likes being the leader of the attack. He is one of those guys that he wants the ball in big situations. Yes, he makes mistakes, but he doesn’t shy away from wanting the occasion. If you have players like that who aren’t afraid to make mistakes, who can get under the skin of opposition because of the way that they want to be in the game, they are the guys you want.”
The Punjab Kings assistant coach said Siraj was hungry to win the fifth Test on the final day for his team.
Haddin added, “He wanted the ball in that last hour of play. There’s no way in the world he didn’t want to bowl every over to win the game. He dropped the catch. That’s a bad miss, your details got to be better there when you are catching that. But that also didn’t define him by the Test match. We are not going to talk about that catch now.”
On the other hand, Shubman Gill was able to lead from the front as he aggregated 754 runs in the five-match Test series and the former gloveman said these are encouraging signs for India.
Haddin concluded, “We have seen a bit of that in the IPL, that the captaincy doesn’t affect his batting, which is a really good sign. Captaincy, he’s going to grow into it. He made some tactical moves that were good, others where he was a little bit behind the game, but there’s a lot of life in this Indian cricket team.”
Gill and Siraj will look to carry the good show.
