Gujarat Titans fast bowler Lockie Ferguson scripted history in the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Sunday as he bowled the fastest delivery of the 2022 season, breaking the previous mark set by SunRisers Hyderabad (SRH) speedster Umran Malik in the tournament.
Lockie Ferguson – a lanky New Zealand pacer, known for producing express deliveries with regularity, was in good rhythm, especially at the start of his spell against Rajasthan Royals in the title clash at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.
Lockie Ferguson was introduced into the attack in the fifth over of the game and wasted little time in ramping up the pace as he bowled the last ball of the over at a scorching speed of 157.3 kmph.
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The record for bowling this season's fastest bowl was earlier held by Srinagar-born Indian pacer Umran Malik who produced a 157 kmph delivery against Delhi Capitals' batter Rovman Powell in the competition. Umran, however, conceded a boundary on that ball.
The 22-year-old cricketer from Kashmir has seen his stock rise considerably in Indian cricket after his heroics in the IPL.
Not only Umran troubled the opposition batsman with his pace as most of his deliveries clocked well over the 150 kmph mark in the cash-rich league, but also impressed former greats of the game with his attitude and composure on the field.
Umran Malik eventually ended the tournament with a rich haul of 22 wickets. The Indian selectors, meanwhile, were mightily impressed with his performance in the IPL and gave him a place in the national team for the upcoming T20I series against South Africa at home.
Coming back to Lockie Ferguson, his ball was a peach of a delivery, a perfect yorker, to say the least, bowled at an express pace of 157.3 to RR's dangerman Jos Buttler.
But like Umran, Ferguson too missed the all-time IPL record by a whisker.
The record for bowling the fastest ball in IPL's history belongs to Australia's Shaun Tait who bowled a 157.71 snorter to his Australia teammate Aaron Finch who was then representing Delhi Capitals in the 2011 season.
Fast bowling is regarded as one of the injury-prone arts in cricket but Oceania nations Australia and New Zealand continue to produce great speedsters.
Lockie Ferguson's other Kiwi colleague Trent Boult is another great exponent of pace bowling and has been the backbone of the Rajasthan Royals' attack this season.
India, on the other hand, struggled to find exceptional fast bowling talent during the 1990s and 2000s. But things have changed for good in recent years, with the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Siraj, and Shardul Thakur delivering on the world stage.
These men have been the architects of India's most famous overseas wins of late, having powered ex-captain Virat Kohli‘s side to back-to-back Test series triumphs in Australia in 2019 and 2021.
The current Indian pace attack has been dubbed as the best in the world by several ex-cricketers, including Pakistan's Ramiz Raja and the legendary Sachin Tendulkar.
“There is now no greater bowling attack in the world than India's. The days of India attacking and dominating with spin bowling are long gone, and now it's all about pace. And if you have Siraj Miyaan then fikar-not (don't worry) since his temperament is identical to Virat Kohli's. When Kohli hands him the bowl, he turns the game on its head and makes an impossible situation possible with his spirit and quality,” Ramiz said on his YouTube channel last year.
“This is, I think, as a unit, possibly the best fast bowling unit today in the world and they deserve that title according to me because they have really bowled well in foreign conditions where there is not much help to spinners, the fast bowlers have raised their hands up and turned the whole game upside down,” Tendulkar told the Times of India.
India's cricketers are on the cusp of a memorable victory against England as well as they currently lead the five-match series 2-1 with the rescheduled fifth Test match set to be played in Birmingham in the first week of July later this year.
It was India's pacers who succeeded in putting the team ahead in the series as they took 16 wickets in the fourth match in England. Bumrah in particular was nearly unplayable, picking up a total of 8 wickets at the Oval in London to complete a sensational turnaround for the visitors in the match after England took a 99-run lead in the first innings.
But the Indian fast bowlers shone brightly in the second essay, dismissing England for 210 after Rohit Sharma's brilliant 127 put the South Asians in the ascendancy.
Jasprit Bumrah and company will be back showing their exemplary skills next month when the Indians square off against the South Africans in a T20I series at home.
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