How personal tragedy motivates India seamer Deep
'He thought only the rich could play cricket'
While Deep's name only began resonating in cricket circles after his 10 wickets at Edgbaston, his story stretches far deeper.Born in a small village in Bihar, one of India's most economically challenged states, Akash grew up believing cricket was a game for the wealthy. It was his childhood friend Vaibhav Kumar who first instilled belief in him."Cricket wasn't very popular in Bihar back then. In our entire district, barely 20 to 25 people were playing leather-ball cricket," Vaibhav says. "Akash mostly played with a tennis ball, but whenever we took him along for a leather-ball match, he would always help us win. But Akash thought that only the rich could play cricket."Vaibhav, a cricketer himself, became convinced of Deep's talent after watching professional players up close."We went to Jamshedpur, where a few Ranji Trophy and IPL players were playing in an academy. When I saw them bowling, I was like 'Akash is faster and better than them'," he recalls."I asked the coaches there to take a look at him, and they were impressed too. They said if not India, Akash could definitely play IPL as long as he works hard."But before Deep could fully commit to the sport, tragedy struck. His father died in 2015, followed by his elder brother just six months later.With no primary breadwinner in the family, cricket was put on hold."He bought a dumper on partnership after saving some money from farming and used it to earn a living. His mother also received half of her late husband's salary, which helped the family get by," Vaibhav says.Deep left the game for nearly three years, but his passion for cricket never fully disappeared. Determined to chase his dream, he decided to relocate to Bengal."My father was posted in Bengal, and we decided to rent a flat there. I went to different clubs and asked them to consider Akash, but they would make fun of me," Vaibhav says."But I didn't give up and requested one of the coaches multiple times to take a look at him just once. After seeing him, they agreed to play him."
'He had to believe in himself'
That proved to be the turning point. Deep soon began playing in Bengal's domestic circuit and was quickly noticed."He was on the fringes. But it was pretty evident that he was an exceptional talent. He had a lot of strength, good pace, and a natural ability to swing the ball. So, we brought him into the team and he did exceedingly well," says former India cricketer Arun Lal, then Bengal's coach."He was so good that I am rather disappointed that it has taken him so long to surface on the international stage."But talent alone wasn't enough. Arun had to work on Akash's mindset."He underestimated himself. So the idea was to work on his temperament rather than technique and try to get him to believe in himself," Arun says.His domestic performances eventually earned him a spot in the IPL, and soon after, in India's Test squad. Deep made his international debut in early 2024 against England, picking up three wickets.It seemed his fortunes had finally turned. But more hardship was around the corner."His sister was diagnosed with cancer. He went through a lot of stress and would even turn his phone off. He was feeling mentally down since he had already lost his father and brother. But thankfully, she is fine now," Vaibhav says.Deep later dedicated his performance at Edgbaston to his sister."Every time I picked up the ball, her thoughts and picture crossed my mind. This performance is dedicated to her. I want to tell her, 'Sis, we are all with you.'"After Edgbaston, Deep struggled at Lord's and missed the Old Trafford Test through injury, but his absence was felt as his replacement, Anshul Kamboj, struggled to adapt to English conditions.His return to the team cannot come quickly enough.
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The Guardian
10 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Are you not wowed? Bazball, India and a one-armed man deliver drama and beauty
Well, that was something new. Have you ever seen the one-armed man running a bye to the keeper while 20,000 people leap and writhe and hold their heads and the one-armed man shouts in agony? Have you ever seen figures picked out in silhouette at the top of the stand, posed in perfect shapes of triumph, dread and fear because another gobbet of time has passed, another dot, because essentially nothing has happened? Have you ever seen the one-armed man walk down and prod the middle of the wicket between balls, like this is just another cricket day, and had to swallow a snort of disbelief at the extreme cinematic weirdness of this snapshot in time? At times such as these, immersed in the super-heated bubble at the final day at the Oval, all of this stuff undeniably happening but also basically nothing, a story told only to itself, you do wonder how you'd explain it to someone from Denmark. Words such as nuance, post-colonial, will, protocol gabbled out while the person from Denmark nods politely. Wait. Geopolitics! Hunger! Umpire's call! And all of this expressed through 25 days of the most stiffly choreographed sporting activity ever devised. This is a game that takes place in trousers. It's a dance around a semi-invisible dark red ball. Two hours after the final notes at the Oval all that was left on one of the upper staircases in the stand at the Vauxhall End was a single abandoned black leather slip-on shoe with an empty carton of snus balanced on top of it, and you thought, yeah, that seems about right. At the end of which India did definitely win here by six runs. On a grey and smudged south London morning, the Oval felt like a mini-Glastonbury before play. All the notes were here, the hum, the crackle, the shouts, the Indian section in the stands rising to wave at Dinesh Kartik as he marched across this sallow old lime green oval like a presidential candidate. This is a very distinct stage for urban sporting theatre. Crawl past on a 36 bus and you get to peer in over that high wall into an empty secret garden, peopled for six months of the year by a man with a broom, but tended and cherished for moments like this when it feels like nowhere else in the world could possibly exist; and where suddenly something comes up out of the soil, echoes of other days, stored up energy, ghosts at the edge of the action. The first of those, that first Ashes Test in 1881, was so tense it is said one spectator died of a heart attack, while another chewed through an umbrella handle as Fred 'the Demon' Spofforth worked his way through England's batsmen. What was the modern equivalent here? Breaking your refresh button? Spontaneously combusting your own vape? Cricket, which is always dying even while it throbs with vibrant life, is always doing this to us, and always questioning itself, wondering about the end times even while it's out there writing Ulysses again. Here England needed 35 to win and India three and a half wickets to level the series. The players came out to a huge rolling wave of applause, India's fielders breaking from their huddle to sprint in unison, impossibly heroic already, a group who have given us everything over the last two months. And this was a day for Mohammed 'the Demon' Siraj, who really is the most lovable maniac in sport, and who bowled like a god here to win this game. Jamie Overton hooked the first ball for four and Surrey-cut the next one and you waited for the energy to shift. Prasidh Krishna just laughed and you loved him for it. Jamie Smith still looked stuck, frozen, drained and was duly euthanised from the crease. England tried to Baz this, to play shots, because how else? But the ball was talking too, and the ball will have its say. Overton lasted one delivery from Siraj, who was bowling to his own stirring one-man montage soundtrack by now. Simple pieces of Test cricket, a leave, were greeted with huge cheers and gasps like Puccini being roared on by a heavy metal stadium. Josh Tongue came and went like filler in a western who exists only to be gunned down in the final shootout. And so it came to pass, as Chris Woakes walked down the pavilion steps for his Lord Nelson moment. Kiss me, Gus. This should not be happening. A one-armed man, sling tucked weirdly inside his woollen jumper, is trying to play elite sport. Gus Atkinson slogged a swirling six over long-on, like a man throwing the last sticks of furniture on to the fire. There was wild impromptu chatter about the tactics, the game-state of how to rotate the one-armed man, how to farm him, all of it just noise in the dark. Siraj was always going to close this out. Atkinson's off-stump was flattened and the moment seemed to stretch out. There was a breath, a beat, before the chaos of victory kicked in, figures running everywhere, an unceasing well of drama, needle, blood, skill leading to the perfect symmetry of a 2-2 draw. And all the while underneath the static and the shouts something else seemed to settle, the sound of quiet applause. Never mind the score, or the arguments over moments, luck, injury, whatever. It is simply time for hats off here. Plaudits to India for a wonderful effort. And from a home point of view, for Ben Stokes and the Bazball project. Sign up to The Spin Subscribe to our cricket newsletter for our writers' thoughts on the biggest stories and a review of the week's action after newsletter promotion For all the bullshit, the moments of head-scratch, the infuriating asides, these lunatics are producing something entirely new. 'Are You Not Entertained?' doesn't really do it justice. Are you not wrung out, frazzled, wowed? It has been the most glorious experiment, moments of beauty, fun and impossible drama set always to its own insistent set of rhythms. And who knows, we may not see this again. This may be the thing, right here. Who knows if Stokes will play another Test in England? The plan is to keep rolling on, but Australia tends to be a bookend and England's captain has been playing at this level for 14 years. Woakes may be done. Joe Root, surely not. Mark Wood, not sure. Jofra Archer not sure. But what a show they have given us. What are they going to say about Bazball? Who's going to tell them? What sense will this make when cricket has become the Ryder Cup or some colours on a screen with a shouting man from Love Island? Even the ceremonials at the end were part of the theatre, like the final act of a Shakespeare comedy when all returns to laughter, bonds are formed, hands shaken, misunderstandings corrected. Stokes was pale and terse in the bowels of the Oval indoor school, but he talked first about the spectacle and the brilliance of the series. England do like to chat about being the saviours of Tests. There is self-interest in this. It's a very well paid job. But it is also love, devotion and faith. 'As a massive advocate of this format … this has certainly been one of those series that can keep that narrative around Test cricket is dying … so … well,' Stokes shrugged, while also sniffing at the idea Harry Brook had let his team down by scoring the wrong kind of 111. Stokes made a good point about the selflessness of the remaining England seamers, putting their bodies on the line to fill the breach left by Woakes. He talked about Siraj with genuine admiration, which will, you feel, mean a lot to the man himself. He said he would now be 'knocking about' The Hundred, which is a bit like Odin announcing at the end of the Asgard-Jotunheim War that he fancies a game of Bop-It now. And so we must talk about the past and future, both of which do still have to exist outside the moment. Bazball can be maddening, cult-like, just another clique. England have talked mind-bending rubbish at times. There have been shoulders picks, good-around-the-group picks. Any divvying up of this result should dwell on the selection of two players who just haven't had any cricket, most obviously Jacob Bethell, who was shunted into the light and produced a tortured innings, a man out there batting with a stale baguette. The Baz-era has been maddening to every person from every other country who has ever heard a self-assured Englishman explaining the world to them while simultaneously conveying that, yeah, you're doing really well, but we do still own this. The super cool optics, the iconography of lounging exceptionalism. It has been very funny at times. But this thing has also produced utterly thrilling cricket, sport that is simply unlike the stuff that went before. It has been postmodernism at times, taking these structures and relics and trying to do something new. What is batting? What is a game for? What is a nightwatchman? Test cricket is always an interplay of rules, shapes, tradition and the slightly tortured individuals at its centre. This has been pure personality, those old rules and protocols bent into a framework for self-expression. It also gave us this final day, because England kept playing the same way to the end rather than falling into respectable defeat, a strange blend of colour will, drama, art, maths, salt, sweet, sour, bitter, umami; and a reminder that this sport will always leave you both stuffed to the gills and deliciously unsatisfied. At close of play it no longer felt like a chilly November morning. It felt like February. It isn't overly dramatic to say this might yet be the high point of all this. We will now need to talk about team building and the future. England do look well set for the Ashes, if the bowling can settle down and bodies heal. For now it is probably best just to be glad we got to see it.
Daily Mail
10 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
There is more to Mohammed Siraj than England's nickname for him - he is a born entertainer with skill, heart and passion, writes NASSER HUSSAIN
This series got the scoreline it deserved because a 3-1 victory would have flattered England given the number of sessions India won, the fact they had its leading run getters, lost all five tosses and had to rest their premier fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah. Of course, they ended up winning the two games that Bumrah didn't play, and the reason for that was because of one man, really - Mohammed Siraj. How fitting it was for him to get the final wicket of the best finale imaginable. On Sunday, I was critical that the match wasn't finished on the fourth evening, but then we would have been denied a box office hour's play in front of a sellout crowd, a huge proportion of which were Indian fans, and Siraj bowling superbly. It was an incredible final twist when you consider that he endured two of the most traumatic moments of these epic matches. The obvious one at Lord's, dragging the ball onto his stumps for England to go 2-1 up, and then down at fine leg at The Oval, stepping over the rope to reprieve Harry Brook 19 runs into a hundred. The second incident could have been like that Shane Warne moment in the 2005 Ashes when he gave Kevin Pietersen a life on the same ground. Not remembered for bowling your heart out and being the leading wicket-taker in the series, but for a dropped catch. Luckily for him, though, he's got the fitness and will to succeed, meaning he will keep going as long as the opposition are out there. Captains love people like him that will literally bowl all day. The Indian public love the game of cricket, and want to see that their players care too. There were women in tears in the crowd, it meant so much to them. Siraj is a cricketer that always gives it everything. Yes, he plays the pantomime villain at times, a bit like Warney did, and so people love to hate him, but he regularly has that massive smile on his face too. He's fiery, the England boys call him Mr. Angry, and he has the longest follow through in the history of the game, but he demands your attention. You could do a montage of the histrionics - down on his knees in despair at Lord's, the celebrations and dejection when DRS decisions go one way or another. He's a born entertainer, but crucially he's got all the other attributes you need at the highest level: heart, passion, and ultimately skill. He's gone from being a hit-the-deck bowler using wobble seam to trap people LBW - as he did with Joe Root - to one who has developed outswing so big that Shubman Gill wasn't interested in taking the second new ball. Then, there is the fabulous yorker, such as the one to Crawley late on day three. He went to it again just before midday, knowing that Gus Atkinson was trying to hit him over midwicket for a second six that would have tied the game, nailing it under the most immense pressure. If Siraj gets it wrong, India lose the series, so it was perfect execution from a champion cricketer that has unfairly courted controversy over the past month. It was very harsh when he got fined for making physical contact with Ben Duckett at Lord's, because although I don't like physical contact in cricket, it was accidental. He didn't move in Duckett's direction. And the game is worse off if you have 22 robots with no passion. Being in opponents' faces makes him tick. Occasionally as captain you might have to drag him out of the face of a batter because you don't want him to be spending all his match fee on fines or getting banned, but you'd rather have that than someone who's a bit meek and doesn't feel that the cauldron of Test cricket is one they belong in. The fifth morning was so dramatic that you really couldn't script it, concluding the best series I've seen since 2005. It has carried that extra layer of commitment and intensity: Rishabh Pant hobbling down the stairs to bat with a broken foot in Manchester, Chris Woakes going out there with a dislocated shoulder here. Now it's finished, I will miss it. So incredible has it been that it makes you wonder why this format is ever questioned? If you landed someone 30 days ago and took them around this country's Test match venues, asking them: Is this thing we call Test cricket working? They'd look at you funny. It's so bloody good. It's importance is why Woakes ventured out at No 11, and it was nice that three or four of the Indian players went up to him and patted him, thankfully on the right shoulder, saying: 'Good luck.' The series has been incredible and makes you wonder why the format is ever questioned Fortunately for him, the wicket fell on the last ball of the over, so he wasn't on strike, but even running through for singles, he was in agony. There has to be a duty of care towards players, but he told his team-mates there was no other option for him. He cares deeply about England and winning for his country, and he'd never have forgiven himself if he stayed in the dressing room when they needed 15-20 to win. His attitude - coupled with the brilliance of Siraj - is why we love this game so much.
Daily Mail
10 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Why Jacob Bethell needs time, the big Ashes calls facing England... and don't tell me Test cricket is dying - BUMBLE ON THE TEST
A thrilling conclusion to the fifth and final Test saw Mohammed Siraj inspire India to victory against England, with the series ending in a 2-2 draw. England needed 35 runs to win when play resumed on Monday at the Oval, only for Jamie Smith, Jamie Overton and Josh Tongue to fall. It led to Chris Woakes walking out with his left arm in a sling to protect his injured shoulder, as Gus Atkinson attempted to steer England to victory. Siraj ultimately bowled Atkinson to guide India to victory by six runs, concluding a gripping series between the teams. Mail Sport's David Lloyd - AKA Bumble – was among those left gripped by the action on the final day. In the latest edition of Bumble on the Test, he offers his thoughts on some of the key talking points following the match and the series itself. Don't tell me Test cricket is dying What a game. What a series. I was glued to that on Monday and in the end, a draw is a fair reflection on the series. This was the kind of contest that had me missing my playing days. Don't ever tell me that Test cricket is dying or that it's dead. The players of both sides can take a massive bow for providing us with such a spectacle. Passionate Siraj comes of age for India A coming of age for Mohammed Siraj. From the moment he dropped that catch, the response was unreal with such passion and endeavour in every over he bowled. It was the moment said to himself that this is down to me. The lad was bowling for the whole nation and was the main reason why India won this Test. What a competitor. Bethell needs time despite mind blowing dismissal I feel for Jacob Bethell. With the game seemingly won, the irresponsible shot from him on day four was mind blowing. In mitigating circumstances, he just hasn't batted enough this summer. The young lad is a victim of the system that plucks in players with barely any first-class experience. Bethell is talented but needs time in the middle. Valiant Woakes battles through the pain barrier When Chris Woakes came out to bat, he looked like an Egyptian mummy. Whatever was under that sweater, it beggars belief. Credit to Woakes because that was a valiant effort. You could see the pain etched on his face and Gus Atkinson did wonderfully well to shield him. But it wasn't to be and Siraj had the last word. Of course he did. Nothing comes close to the five-day game Now it's time for The Hundred to take priority in August. With all that money coming in, you can see why but it's a shame that we're done with Test cricket for the summer. I hope you agree with me that nothing, and I mean nothing, comes close to the five-day game - especially when it's played like we've seen over the last six weeks. India's love of the game can only be a good thing Seeing the Indian players doing their lap of honour, you could see what it means to the players. Even the supporters have been great. We've seen it before but cricket really is the be all and end all for them. It's a legacy passed down through families and long may it continue. That love for our game can only ever be a good thing. England facing big Ashes calls Looking ahead to The Ashes, it's a question of who's vulnerable for England. The opening pair are nailed on but Ollie Pope must be looking over his shoulder. Gus Atkinson has shown his credentials and I wonder if they'll stick with Shoaib Bashir. Ricky Ponting says he is a must down under and I tend to agree with Ricky.
