Vinay Kumar: Coming back to life

An example of a bad nightmare for a fast bowler is when a batsman steps out and tonks you for a straight six over your head. It’s worse when he does it to you in your first over of the day. It’s worst when it’s your debut. And it’s unimaginable if it happens on a fast bowler’s paradise like Perth.

Not too many survive the same. Most thought Ranganath Vinay Kumar would go the same way. In any case, he belonged to a breed of fast bowlers who are on the decline internationally – the ones who rely on outswingers and legcutters over fast inswinging yorkers. After Venkatesh Prasad and before Vinay Kumar, there were two others from the same state of Karnataka – Dodda Ganesh and David Johnson. Both flitted on the international circuit briefly before fading away into obscurity.

By the end of that fateful season, Vinay Kumar was out of the Indian team. Luck handed him a second chance though as he bagged a million dollar contract on his comeback to the Royal Challengers Bangalore after a couple of seasons with the ill-fated Kochi Tuskers. He ended the 2012 IPL as the best bowler for Bangalore with 19 wickets in 15 matches, ahead of Zaheer Khan who had played one match more.

But more bad luck was on its way. A hamstring injury saw him getting replaced by Irfan Pathan for the Sri Lanka series at the start of the new season. As Vinay dealt with injury and frustration, Irfan grabbed this opportunity with both hands as he put in crucial performances with both bat and ball to secure a place in the World T20 squad. In any case, the whole nation wants Irfan Pathan to do well and nobody is bothered about Vinay Kumar.

While the Indian team struggled to get its campaign in place in Sri Lanka, Vinay travelled down south to New Zealand with the A team. A couple of impressive performances later, he was captaining Karnataka in the Ranji Trophy. After four winless games which includes an upset by a team like Odisha, you do not expect to reach the quarter finals of India’s premier first class competition.

Yet Vinay Kumar was quietly confident of doing so – a trait which he has mastered over his career. A country which dreams of producing an express pace bowler and a fast bowling allrounder has no respect for the numerous workmanlike medium pacers who toil day in and day out on its unresponsive batsman-friendly pitches. Most give up; some like Vinay keep on trying. He battled injury, form and luck at times to take Karnataka to the quarter finals where, in his absence, they lost to a resurgent Saurashtra side at home.

He was overlooked for the T20 series against England for a bowler of his ilk who has found success of late – Lakshmipathy Balaji. A stress injury to Balaji’s toe provided him a backdoor entry as a replacement, only for the door to be shut rudely on his face in the form of a calf strain.

He got his next opportunity more than four months later as the IPL came calling again. Zaheer was out with injury and suddenly Vinay found himself leading the Royal Challengers bowling attack. He led by example, finishing the season as the highest wicket taker second time in a row. Vinay took 23 wickets in all; no one else managed more than 13.

But what was more important was the way he shepherded the RCB bowling lineup. Back in 2011 when he was about 10 ODIs old, Vinay had made a statement that he saw himself as the leader of India’s ODI bowling attack. On the surface, it was more than audacious; below, it showed the confidence of a man who had realized what his role in the team was. The Indian attack at that time consisted of Vinay, Umesh Yadav and Varun Aaron. The latter two were the fastest and, arguably, the most promising fast bowlers to come out of the country for a while. But they were greener than a blade of grass and, more so, in front of the number of years that Vinay had spent in plying his trades on the domestic circuit. He lived up to his word by taking a four wicket haul in his next innings, but no one noticed.

Apart from this, he has mentored the likes of Abhimanyu Mithun and Sreenath Aravind for quite some time now, pushing both to the brink of national selection. Hence, when he was given charge of Jaydev Unadkat for this year’s IPL, Vinay had years of experience to fall back on and Unadkat prospered, taking 13 wickets to finish as the joint second highest wicket-taker for the Royal Challengers.

His performances over the last two seasons warrant a retainer from Bangalore for 2014 but there are greater duties at hand. He heads next month for the Champions Trophy in England, where he will be involved in a three-way tussle with Irfan Pathan and Ishant Sharma to take over the third medium pacer’s slot behind Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Umesh Yadav. Irfan’s batting skills or Ishant’s reputation may prolong his wait to add to his number of ODI caps, but rest assured, Vinay will give it his all when he gets his chance.