Malinga's magical spell

Smashing world record :

by Ranjan Anandappa

"Malinga nearly sent us in smoke", these were the words of the panic stricken South African captain Graeme Smith who witnessed the final stages of the Super 8 World Cup cricket match against Sri Lanka from the dressing room with his side suddenly plunging towards defeat from a seemingly easy winning position.

The 23 year old Lasith Malinga, bowling at 90 mph, created history in international cricket to become the first to take four wickets off four balls as he just failed to take his side to an improbable win against South Africa.

The Proteas were cruising smoothly in pursuit of a modest 210 runs to win in their 50 overs. With skipper Smith and Jacques Kallis providing the backbone of the South African side, it seemed it was just a matter of time for the South Africans to wrap up the match in their favour in the 44th over.

Malinga who had a bit of a bashing in his first spell produced a magical second spell in the 45th over and took away the anticipative smiles from the South African faces when he sent Shuan Pollock, Andrew Hall, Kallis and Ntini in a four ball burst which included a hat-trick to bring Sri Lanka within a touching distance of a victory.

Malinga never dreamt of taking up cricket as a career. Many people predicted that his bowling career would be short lived due to his unorthodox or as many people called it a square arm slinging action which is prone to injury and not found in coaching manuals.

In 1999 young Malinga played his first hard ball cricket match representing his school Vidyaloka Vidyalaya in Galle in the under 17 tournament mainly because the team was short of a player. He took a wicket in his first ball and ended up taking four wickets.

Thereafter, the then Mahinda College coach Keerthie Dharmapriya spotting the youngster's talent invited him to join Mahinda College. He represented Mahinda for three years. During this period he was also selected to represent a Board XI to meet Kenya and took 4 wickets. In the same year he also played against an Indian 'A' team which toured the Island.

Malinga was born on August 28 1983, and made his first ODI debut in 2004 at Dambulla against a team from the United Arab Emirates. He made his Test debut in 2004 against Australia in Darwin. So far, he has represented the country in 32 ODI's with 50 wickets and has played in 21 Test Matches with 71 wickets. His best Test bowling analysis is 5 for 68.

Malinga is a typical village lad who preferred swimming and playing carom as a hobby. Tree climbing was also one of his favourite pastimes. This would have made him a tough guy.

Even before he was picked to tour Australia with the test team under Marvan Atapattu, he was considered as a fastest bowler in domestic cricket. His slinging square arm action has given enough food for thought for world class batsmen. He created a lot of anxiety in the minds of the Australian batsmen in his first tour. In New Zealand his action caused havoc and the Kiwis had to request the officiating umpires even to change their dark trousers as they found it difficult to spot the ball due to his awkward action.

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