Notes From the World Cup: Mohammed Shami, From The Louvre To The Bench

A pearl, but not for the first counter

Mohammed Shami is the most beautiful bowler at this World Cup. I don't mean to bring up his spiked hair, raised collar, and near-perfect-but-slightly-chaotic beard. I'm referring to beauty of a specific kind. The kind that fans get to observe for loops of six minutes every time it appears on the screen. The kind that creates pretty shapes while executing the most aggressive task in cricket. The kind that makes watchers, including me, weak in the knees.

Firstly, the architecture. Some fast bowlers carve a niche in public consciousness through sheer athleticism. Allan Donald and Michael Holding had physiques and run-ups that you could write songs to. They were Greek gods gliding on grass. Shami isn't quite that breed. He doesn't bustle in with the venom of a rhinoceros who has spotted trespassing Instagrammers in a forest, neither does he have the languid jog of an Olympic sprinter. His run-up is just about quick enough. Instead, his symmetry sets him apart. It is a visual marvel. The arms are equidistant from the torso, even while moving quickly to generate speed; the torso, itself, is as straight as the pitch he approaches; his leap is so perfectly timed that I don't think he has ever landed wrong; and the final release is a decrescendo where his limbs move in concert before his wrists, loose and perpendicular to the sky, add the coup de grace. It should be acceptable to pause the broadcast for a couple of seconds at this point.

We are only halfway there. After the release comes the craft. As the ball leaves his hand, its alignment is a picture of geometric perfection, as if hand-drawn into the video frame by a painter. There is a subtle, often late, movement in the air, leaving batters with wobbly feet at a point when they should be rock solid. The ball finishes with a zip off the pitch, jubilant at completing a journey directed by an artist. I wonder if the opposition batters feel like clapping sometimes.

No one, and I include Jasprit Bumrah, Mitchell Starc, Kagiso Rabada, and Trent Boult in that list, can make bowling look as artful.

In the winter of 2013, when Indian cricket fans were hyperventilating from the ominous prospect of away tours to South Africa, New Zealand, England, and Australia within the next year, Shami came as a breeze to cool some of the sweat down. He picked up nine wickets in his debut Test match, and we were in love.

It has been a decade since, and that fondness has rarely flickered. Shami has, like every cricketer, had to navigate the sine-wave nature of form and success in elite sport, but without ever losing his artistry. Matches, series, and seasons came and went, Shami would sometimes bathe in wickets and other times make you tear your hair apart with his propensity to dish out buckets of candy to the batters. He could be a miracle and misfit within the same over. Maybe there was a charm to it, because from that volatility came objects of rare splendour. Somewhere on YouTube, there is a clip of Shami's best wickets. It is best watched alone because you don't want to be squealing in public.

Ssup, Faf? Photo credits: Associated Press

With age, that storm has become a steady wind. Shami is now a bank for captains, always ready to bowl himself into the ground, ready to attack, ready to defend. His report card, a sterile accessory to the colours on his canvas, is not half bad. More than 400 international wickets at an average of 26.5. He is a big fish in a small pool of good seam bowlers in Indian history. How, then, does he find himself relegated to the bench so often in limited-overs cricket? Why did it take a few games to pass by before he could bowl a ball at the 2019 World Cup? Why has the same script been reread in 2023? Last evening, after another spell of beauty and precision, and the small matter of five wickets, these questions hung in the thick air of Dharamshala.

Shami's misfortune comes from the shortcomings of an imbalanced side. Over the last few years, which have engulfed this and the previous ODI World Cup, India have played with a batting order that offers nothing with the ball and a bowling attack that offers nothing with the bat. In no other serious team will you find this kind of lopsidedness while also retaining elite-level quality. This World Cup, Shami is competing with the genius of Jasprit Bumrah and the control of Mohammed Siraj for two spots in the playing lineup. Only an injury to Hardik Pandya opened up a spot for him in yesterday's game against New Zealand. On most days, India cannot afford to play all three while also keeping Kuldeep Yadav. That's four non-batters in a World Cup game, a similar adventure to trekking a mountain in Crocs.

Bumrah is the bowling equivalent of Sachin Tendulkar in this team, so his spot is not up for debate. Siraj, however, opens a conversation. He hasn't had the brightest start to the World Cup, and when the other seamer rocks up and turns in a five-wicket haul, questions aren't completely out of order. But you look at Siraj's consistency over the last couple of years, where he has helmed India's white-ball bowling in Bumrah's prolonged absence, and the conversation begins to soften. 60 wickets at a barely believable average of 21. Mostly delivered on flat decks in India. Just a month and a bit back, he reduced an Asia Cup final to a darts game, polishing off the entire Sri Lankan batting order before most of us had even settled into our sofas. One can never begrudge Shami a place in the team - he deserves it - but he was always going to start the World Cup next in the pecking order after two exceptional talents. His fiver last night is not so much a Fuck You to the team management, but a quiet reminder of the depth and variance they can tap into. Great teams often have very good players sitting out.

Shami is 33. Fast bowlers don't usually play into their late 30s, so this could be his last ODI World Cup. Given his sustained brilliance in Test cricket, he might even give this format up soon after the World Cup. Mohammed Shami with the red ball is a work of art worthy of the Louvre, but even with the white ball, he can warrant a spot at most cathedrals. How many can say that about themselves?