Haryana off-spinner Nikhil Kashyap New Delhi: Growing up in Rohtak, Nikhil Kashyap spent his teenage years playing cricket with a tennis ball and bowling with his carrom ball, an art he learned after spending hours on YouTube watching R Ashwin’s bowling videos.“He (Ashwin) is my idol. I have spent hours watching his videos. He is a magician,” Kashyap told TimesofIndia.com in an exclusive interview.
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“I’m a big fan of his variations, especially how he tricks right-handed batsmen,” he says.With 24 wickets in five matches, the 25-year-old set the Ranji Trophy on fire in his debut season. The Haryana off-spinner is ninth on the list of leading wicket takers and is the only off-spinner in the top 20.In a country full of cricketing talent across skills, there is a dearth of quality off-spinners coming through the system. They have become an endangered species in Indian cricket. After R Ashwin, Washington Sundar carries the baton, but in domestic cricket, the crop seems to have dried up. Very few can dispute Washington’s place. With leg and left-arm spinners dominating both the white-ball and red-ball formats, off-spinners have slipped down the pecking order.
I love bowling for right handed batsmen. Another level of satisfaction is when you get them out after setting them up in a flat track spell.
Nikhil Kashyap
The selectors focused on Pulkit Narang before the focus shifted to Tanush Kotian, who was even flown to Australia during the Border Gavaskar Trophy when R Ashwin dropped the retirement bomb. Madhya Pradesh’s Saransh Jain’s name has also been doing the rounds, but none of them have made a compelling case for selection.“Being an off-spinner is a challenge,” admits Kashyap, who made his first-class debut this season only after veteran off-spinner Jayant Yadav moved to Puducherry.“Offies only get the ball if there is a left-handed batsman at the crease. If the opponent is heavily right-handed, you will see left-handed bowlers operating from both ends. It happens in age-group cricket as well,” he says.Kashyap, who held a leather ball for the first time at the age of 17, joined the Shri Ram Narain Cricket Club (SRNCC) academy in Rohtak, where his coaches Ashwani Kumar and Tejinder Mann not only honed his skills but also made him realize that if he wanted to have a successful career, he felt he must not think about matches.
A good spinner will take wickets on all pitches. R Ashwin is considered great because he has done well wherever he has played.
Nikhil Kashyap
“There’s no fear in me. I love bowling to right-handed batsmen. It’s a different level of satisfaction when you get them out after putting them in a spell on a flat track,” laughs Kashyap.A late bloomer, Kashyap has not played age group cricket for Haryana. But the Haryana Cricket Association (HCA) believed in him and he played two seasons at the U-23 level. He was selected for the Ranji camp last year but an unfortunate injury cost him the entire season. “The sideline tension delayed my senior debut for Haryana. I was a bit unlucky but hungry,” he says.Like his childhood hero R Ashwin, Kashyap is 6ft 2in and believes he does not rely much on the surfaces with his height.
When the batters come out and hit me over the top, I smile because half the battle is won.
Nikhil Kashyap
“A good spinner will take wickets on all pitches. R Ashwin is considered great because he has done well wherever he has played,” he says.“I feel spin bowling is also an art. You have to pick that one spot and it’s not easy because as a spinner you get greedy when you see the turn and the bounce. So you have to be very careful with speed, variation and length,” he explains.The lanky spinner says what has helped him in his debut season is his variations.“I have four different variations. There is one normal ball (off-spin), one slider, an arm ball and then a carrom ball. I also work on drift if the pitch is seam-friendly,” says Kashyap.
I have to meet Ashwin Bhai. There are many questions in the mind, no one can tell.
Nikhil Kashyap
Off-spinners also struggle to make an impact in red-ball cricket, even at the domestic level. In the shorter formats, they rely on more variation and can often get away with smaller errors due to the spread of the field. But red-ball cricket offers no such cushion; one loose delivery that goes to the boundary immediately relieves all the pressure on the batter.“It’s challenging. But I’m relishing every opportunity. I see myself as a keeper and it’s helped me. I’m going for wickets. The more spin I put on the ball, the better I’ll be. When the batsmen come out and hit me over the top, I smile because I’ve won half the battle. Because for them it’s a release shot, but for me, he’ll try his next time,” he says, and I struggle to get out.
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In modern cricket, white-ball cricket offers more lucrative opportunities and financial rewards than red-ball cricket. However, Kashyap, who is yet to receive a call from an IPL franchise, wants to perform well in white-ball cricket for Haryana and hopes to meet R Ashwin at some point.“Ashwin bhai se have to meet Some questions are asked who can’t tell and just take wickets. (I want to meet Ashwin. I need to ask him a few things. I can’t reveal what it is and I just want to take wickets),” he says.
