Mishra Back With a Bang

 COLOMBO:Just like the lonely trekker who can’t see the wilderness for the trees, Amit Mishra lived life unaware of his significance in the world. Summoned only for sideshows in the limited-over scheme, chided at for his apparent deficiencies, he seemed a seven-year long experiment that was lost in a trial run. 

It would have hurt him, for any leg-spinner of his craft would have wanted to make fame in the longest form of the game. And for four years, he was in absolute Test wilderness. Yes, he adjusted smartly enough to the requirements of skewed formats. But Test cricket, he would swear, is his real stage. 

Like any leg-spinner worth his salt. It seemed more or less over, when he was dumped for the World Cup Down Under, despite useful performances whenever afforded an opportunity. The return to the Test world seemed quite distant a dream. The wiseacres were out with their wisdom—he bowled too slow, fielded sluggishly and possessed little value with the bat.

Then, out of nowhere, Mishra gets this break, possibly his final fling at redeeming a career that began so brightly with a five-for on Test debut against Australia seven years ago. Mess it and he shall be flushed into the gallows. The pressure he felt would have been interminable. But in three innings upon his return, he has gloriously resurrected his Test career, and in the process ticked a few boxes too. If bowling too slow was his perceived deficiency, he has supremely masked it by varying his pace on surfaces that has been slow. But he preserved his trusted allies — flight, drift and turn.

Now, Mishra is no longer that lonely trekker in wilderness. And he knows the world wants him.

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