Eden Gardens, 2018. The giant cauldron was cheering for the local side, Kolkata Knight Riders, in Qualifier 2 of the IPL. Opening the batting, Wriddhiman Saha had top-scored for Hyderabad with a 27-ball 35. Shikhar Dhawan had scored a run fewer. Despite the 56-run opening stand, however, Hyderabad were struggling at 138/7 after 18.1 overs.
The batters had crossed. With the second ball of the over, a young, strapping Shivam Mavi beat Rashid Khan for pace. Until then, Rashid had faced only one ball, from Prasidh Krishna, and had edged it for four. Now he stepped out and lofted it to deep point. Piyush Chawla, who had caught Yusuf Pathan brilliantly at the same position off the first ball, now dropped the catch. Six.
Three balls later, Rashid played a similar shot. This time he cleared Chawla. Six more.
It took Bhuvneshwar Kumar two balls to give Rashid the strike. Rashid lofted Prasidh over his head for four, played the now-familiar wristy swat-flick over square leg for six, and lofted over long on for six more. He remained unbeaten on a 10-ball 34 to take Hyderabad to 174/7.
In another two hours, he had dismissed Chris Lynn, Robin Uthappa, and Andre Russell, caught Shubman Gill and Mavi, and run out Nitish Raha. He had virtually single-handedly destroyed Kolkata.
But more importantly, the IPL got a glimpse of Rashid Khan the batter. He would shine from time to time, but at No. 8, opportunities were scarce. Besides, his bowling scaled altitudes so high that it hardly mattered.
Four seasons later, Hyderabad caused a stir by not retaining Rashid. Gujarat Titans, one of the two expansion teams of the season, acquired him. And Gujarat approached the season differently from most other teams: they focused on building a very strong bowling unit. They focused on pace – even four of them and Pandya – backed by the spin of Rashid.
For batting, they were happy to go in with Hardik Pandya (who might or might not have bowled), Shubman Gill (whose strike rate had been questioned during his Kolkata stint), David Miller (dangerous, if inconsistent); and Jason Roy. They were happy to fill the rest with domestic batters (Abhinav Manohar, Sai Sudharsan); batters who could bowl a few overs (Vijay Shankar, Rahul Tewatia); wicketkeepers who could slog; and Rashid.
Roy would almost certainly have been a must-pick. But in his absence, Gujarat did not mind pushing batters a slot above where they usually bat. Thus, Tewatia bats at six for them and Rashid at seven. In fact, Rashid has already faced more balls at No. 7 for Gujarat than he ever had for Hyderabad, where he was the designated No. 8.
This meant that Gujarat went in with long tails. Against Chennai Super Kings and Hyderabad, their last four were Alzarri Joseph, Lockie Ferguson, Mohammed Shami, and Yash Dayal. They did not swap any of them for a superior batter.
Thus, Rashid batted at No. 7 on both nights. He was aware of two things. First, there was no one after him. And there was a set batter at the other end who would take it deep, so Rashid would have to take the risks.
Gujarat needed 48 in three overs against Chennai when Rashid took 6, 6, 4, 6 off Chris Jordan. Two of the sixes were the trademark wristy flick, a shot that deserves a fancy name like the Helicopter or the Ramp. The other, another a slice over point. Three extremely difficult, unconventional shots that turned the match on its head.
He scored 40 in 21 balls that night. However, before that Jordan over, he had already faced 12 balls. Batting a slot above his usual position enabled him to do that.
Against Hyderabad, he hit a six off Bhuvneshwar Kumar – but that was his only boundary off the first seven balls he faced. Once again, batting a position higher gave him a few extra balls before he could take off, which he did, against Marco Jansen. Gujarat needed 15 off three balls, but Rashid sealed it 6, dot, 6, 6.
A very aggressive batter, Rashid is probably suited more to No. 7 than to No. 8. Unfortunately, he did not get enough opportunities, for Hyderabad played a batter more than Gujarat do. At Gujarat, with more balls to face, he has made the most of his opportunities.
Of course, one may dismiss this as small sample. After all, he has played only two special innings this season. One may also argue that there is not much difference between Nos. 7 and 8 – and he has seldom batted up the order anyway.
However, if one stretches it to all Twenty20 cricket, the sample size becomes significant enough to conclude that Rashid scores at a rapid rate if he gets to face more balls. He strikes at 159 while batting in the top seven, 144 at No. 8, and 131 below that. The difference is starker in the IPL.
There is little doubt over Rashid’s greatness as a bowler. It does not matter what statistic one considers: Rashid’s numbers are so incredible that he passes almost all criteria. Let alone limited-overs formats, even his five Test matches have yielded 34 wickets at 22.35.
In Twenty20 cricket, he is arguably the greatest bowler of all time. But there is more to that: his batting strike rate of 147 – across 1,493 runs – is not a fluke. Perhaps it is time to brand him an all-rounder as well.
Abhishek Mukherjee is the Chief Editor at CricketNews and co-author of Sachin and Azhar at Cape Town.
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