6 modern day wrist spinners who turn googlies more than leg-breaks

India v New Zealand - 2011 ICC World Cup Warm Up Game
Piyush Chawla's career hasn't lived up to its potential

As the game of cricket slowly moved into an entertainment-oriented phase, many feared that the art of wrist spin would struggle for its existence. But not only has it survived, it now rules the roost in the modern day game.

Wrist spinners are known to be the bravest cricketers as they master a skill that is very difficult to execute consistently. They are the need of the hour for every team that wants to do well, especially in the limited overs format.

There are many facets to the art of wrist spin, but the two most important elements of this art are the leg-break and the googly.

Conventionally, leg-break is considered to be the stock ball and googly is used as a surprising element in between to mix things up by majority of wrist spinners. But there are few wrist spinners that are able to extract far more turn from googly than the conventional leg break. Let us have a look at six such bowlers.


#1 Piyush Chawla

When he burst onto the scene in 2006, Piyush Chawla was regarded as the next big thing in Indian cricket.

The leggie has the perfect speed to bowl wrist spin at which the batsmen find it hard to come down the track. But very rarely does he spin the leg break, thus it is fair to say that googly is his stock delivery.

As his career has progressed, Chawla has tried to bowl the leg break by slowing down his pace but googly remains his prime wicket-taking option. Chawla's career might not have flourished the way it should have, but he continues to be a genuine wicket-taking option in the Indian domestic circuit.

#2 Lakshan Sandakan

Ente
Sandakan is quick through the air

Lakshan Sandakan is the first notable chinaman bowler to emerge from Sri Lanka. He, like most other wrist spinners, puts a lot of revolutions on his deliveries and deceives the batsmen in the air.

But his conventional leg breaks rarely seem to spin as ferociously as his googly. There is some turn but it is nowhere near to the degree of turn that his deliveries generate when he bowls the googly.

Sandakan is quick through the air and is ideal for a typical subcontinental wicket that aids spin. However, his career is in initial stages and there is plenty of time for him to develop the conventional leg break and also learn the changes of pace through the air.

#3 Imran Tahir

South Africa v Sri Lanka: Quarter Final - 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup
Perhaps he is the only spinner in this list who uses the leg-break more

Imran Tahir is another wrist spinner who turns googly more than the leg break. Perhaps he is the only spinner in this list who uses the latter more often than the former, but he still picks up most of his scalps through the googly.

He is a product of the limited overs game where the batsmen show no mercy towards the bowler and this justifies his reluctance to flight the ball more often.

The leg-spinners from Tahir keep things tight and he always attacks the stumps while using them. Every now and again he would slip in a googly that would turn ferociously and bamboozle the batsmen.

Rashid Khan

BBL - Strikers v Heat
Rashid's leg breaks also turn

Rashid Khan, the young Afghan sensation, also relies more on his googly than the conventional leg-break. He has an unusual bowling action and hence, he is proving to be a tough nut to crack for batsmen all over the world with his variations.

Even when he bowls quick through the air, he is able to get some healthy purchase from the surface. His leg breaks also turn but he gets a huge turn from his googlies and this, combined with his quickness through the air, gets him the majority of his wickets.

He has been on a roll ever since making his debut for Afghanistan and he surely has a bright future ahead of him.

#5 Amit Mishra

India v Sri Lanka - ICC World Twenty20 Bangladesh 2014 Final
Mishra is slow in the air and gets a prodigious turn from the surface

Another wrist spinner who uses the googly to great effect is Amit Mishra. His greatest strength lies in the changes of pace through the air. He is slow in the air and gets a prodigious turn from the surface.

Mishra, who is an old-fashioned leg-spinner, gets most of his wickets either LBW or bowled, which is a testimony to the strong googly that he possesses. He sets the batsmen up with slow and loopy leg-breaks and then strikes with the googly.

Throughout his career, he has been in and out of the Indian team and has struggled to cement a place for himself in the international squad but there is no denying the fact that he is a genuine wicket-taker.

#6 Ish Sodhi

New Zealand v South Africa - 2nd ODI
Sodhi gets steep bounce which makes it even more difficult for the batsmen

Ish Sodhi, the New Zealand international, also gets a vast majority of his wickets through the googly. What makes him a force to reckon with is the drift that he gets in the air. That, along with the turn that his deliveries generate from the surface is a deadly combination for any batsman to deal with.

He is tall and gets steep bounce which makes it even more difficult for the batsmen to judge the lines and lengths of his deliveries. Sodhi is best known for his spell against India in ICC World T20 2016 at Dharamsala where he put on an exhibition and bamboozled the Indians with his leg-breaks and googlies.

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Edited by Sankalp Srivastava