Fingerspin in the post-doosra era

When umpire Aleem Dar took his empowerment from technology to the next level, ruling Steve Smith out lbw in the WACA Test even when he was more than 2.5m down the wicket, amid the understandably heated debate, Channel 9's newest recruit and the man most in touch with contemporary cricket for them, Kevin Pietersen, made an astute point. Left-arm spinners bowling to right-hand batsmen and offspinners bowling to left-hand batsmen, Pietersen said, had brought lbws back into the game big time.

Miles away, in Asia, the lbw and bowled to spinners - never mind the big turning pitches - have become the slow men's most potent weapon. More so when visiting batsmen face R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in tandem. It is often said about batting in India that it is all fine until the first one jumps at you and lobs up for a catch. With changing skills and pitches, though, the challenge of batting in India is evolving too. As Ashwin and Jadeja showed against New Zealand, and have indeed been showing for some time now, a batsman has to watch out for those two types of dismissals more than bat-pad catches or edges behind the wicket. It is a trend not limited to India's fingerspinners: Sri Lanka's spinners, led by Rangana Herath, dismantled Australia earlier this year through lbw and bowled dismissals.

Over the last five years, the percentage of lbw and bowled dismissals for India spinners have gone up to 43.97 from 37.3 in years 2006 to 2010. The numbers in India have shot up dramatically since 2005: from 31.37% to 47.56% since 2011. Not just the Indian spinners, travelling spinners have benefited too: from 29.71% in the five-year period ending in 2005 to 40.51% since 2011. While the umpires have become more bowler friendly since the advent of DRS - and that effect plays out in non-DRS matches too - the numbers have actually fallen for fast bowlers: from 36.1% from 2001 to 2005 to 32.2% since 2011.

This is no secret in the closed world of cricket circles. When Herath and friends were taking half of their 54 Australian wickets either lbw or bowled, the word around the visiting batsmen was: whatever you do, don't get beaten on the inside edge by a bowler meant to take the ball away from you. New Zealand's coach Mike Hesson articulated this, and the challenge of batting in India, to ESPNcricinfo.

"In many ways it is actually natural variation," Hesson said. "A lot of times you are actually not trying to bowl a straighter one. Sometimes it just lands on the leather and slides on. Other times it hits the seam and spins. You are obviously able to change the seam angle to have a little bit of control over there, but sometimes it is very accidental. That is the reality of it over here. And when it spins, it is extreme turn. You are just hoping that you play and miss.

"You need to be able to protect your stumps. If the ball spins past the outside edge, it is okay. We can accept that. You don't want to be beaten on the inside. That's pretty much everybody's game plan. And around that you need to find ways to score. If it slides in, it is often going down. If it turns past the edge then you play and miss. And there is also a lot of balls that turn an abnormal amount. So you are dealing with three things. That's the challenge of playing in India. Then as the game goes on, uneven bounce comes into play."

Thirteen of the 27 lbws and bowleds that Sri Lanka spinners claimed against Australia were to the straighter delivery. New Zealand batsmen did much better when it came to not getting beaten on the inside: only eight of their 22 lbws and bowleds were to straighter deliveries from bowlers meant to take it away from you. India's spinners showed great skill in finishing on the stumps by still having 22 lbws and bowleds in their 41 wickets; this 53.66% was a rise from 49.18% against South Africa last season.

During the warm-ups on the third morning of the series between India and New Zealand, Ravindra Jadeja and coach Anil Kumble stood at the Green Park pitch in Kanpur and chatted. Kumble asked Jadeja to move his line for left-hand batsmen wider. The ball had started to turn appreciably now, and there was considerable rough outside the left-hand batsmen's off stump. Kumble wanted Jadeja's deliveries to end up on the stumps. Not that Jadeja needed an invitation to do so - he grew up listening to the wicketkeepers and captains shouting "pag maan maar" [hit the batsman on the foot] - but this has been the coming together of three spinners for India who just want to keep hitting the stumps again and again. It is a skill to bowl deliveries that both hit the batsman in line and go on to hit the stumps on pitches that turn so much.

It doesn't translate into as many wickets for visiting spinners because the India spinners are much more accurate, and also because the India batsmen have slightly different techniques. They are adept at staying leg side of the ball, of planting their front foot down along the line of the leg stump and playing the incoming deliveries with their hands. So even when they get their inside edge beaten, because the umpire can see both the off and the middle stump, the ball is generally considered to be going down leg. Visiting batsmen try to get closer to the ball, thus plonking their front foot across and making similar deliveries look like they are hitting the stumps. When Tom Latham showed he was not going to get drawn across, denying Ashwin that lbw, Ashwin gave him the next test by moving over the wicket and successfully played on the outside edge.

The drier the pitch, the more the natural variation. The more accurate you are, the more the chance for the natural variation to get you wickets. That's why India and Sri Lanka spinners have done so well, and have become a mighty challenge for visiting teams. Throw in DRS-empowered umpires who are likely to support the bowlers, and you know how fingerspin has been revived in this post-doosra world.