Zaheer Khan's school of pace is doing just fine

It was a day when the Indian batsmen punished the South African attack and drove the team to a position of great strength. It was also a day that perhaps made it easy to forget the effort of the fast bowlers who got India back into the match with such rapidity that South Africa never quite managed to recover from that blow. Zaheer Khan and Ishant Sharma were making a comeback into the Test team, Mohammad Shami had never played a Test in SA but to put it blunty, they managed to outbowl the best pace bowling attack (Dale Steyn and Vernon Philander are no.1 and no.2 in the ICC rankings) in the world. But while Shami and Ishant played in the ODIs and had some time to find their bearings. Zaheer came into the match cold. He had done the hard yards to make the comeback – worked on his fitness in France and South Africa, played in India A games against the West Indies and bowled around 200 overs between playing for Mumbai in the Ranji Trophy and India ‘A’ against West Indies ‘A’. [caption id=“attachment_1300247” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Zaheer Khan led from the front for India. AP[/caption] However, the international arena is a different ball game. It’s like Sachin Tendulkar playing in Ranji Trophy and doing well but then struggling in international cricket. Domestic cricket is little more than an appetiser for the hardened veterans. In much the same way, being thinner doesn’t make you a better bowler… it just allows you to bowl for longer. Fitness and skill are two very different things. But over the last two days, Zaheer has blown away the clouds of doubt. He has looked fit, run in hard, bowled in the right areas, experimented with his lines and got the results. Some will look at his bowling (26.3-6-88-4) and say he totally rocked his comeback. And that wasn’t all he did. When he wasn’t bowling, he was constantly talking to the other bowlers about their lines and lengths, about the need to hit the deck hard, asking them to be patient. Lot of question marks raised about Zaheer Khan’s fitness and many of them were answered. But at the Wanderers he showed that his value to the team extends well beyond just his bowling. Take for instance an incident that occurred yesterday. Mohammas Shami ran in hard and bowled a short ball that was pulled away for four by Vernon Philander. Immediately, Zaheer ran in from point, put his arm around the youngsters shoulder and talked to him… repeating the message, reassuring him. Dhoni wanted Zaheer to come down to South Africa with the ODI team for precisely this reason. As good as bowling coach Joe Dawes is, he probably will find it difficult to connect with young India pacemen in the way Zaheer can. Most young upcoming pacemen in India look up to Zaheer and his own evolution as a pacer allows him to understand where they are coming from. During the World T20 in Sri Lanka last season, Zaheer was having a torrid time, getting smashed all around the park but whenever skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni was asked about the paceman, his answers betrayed nothing but confidence. “It’s easier to go after the bowler (in T20 matches). If you look at his performance he shoud be given equal respect as Sachin Tendulkar gets. He is the Sachin for us when it comes to the bowling department. He has led the attack for the past few years,” Dhoni had said. After a year on the sidelines, Zaheer is back and India sure are glad.