Like every professional sportsperson, Mohammed Shami has had his fair share of setbacks. Exigencies of form (infrequent), fitness and injuries have kept him out of the national team for large chunks of his international career, now into its 13th year. Off the field, he has been dogged by marital discord that has made its way to public domain, he has been involved in a car accident…
Mohammed Shami may never play for India again (AFP)
At 35, the man from Amroha who made the move to Kolkata aged 15 at the insistence of his Moradabad coach Badruddin Siddique to further his cricketing ambitions is clearly much closer to the end of his competitive career than its beginning. And unless something dramatic transpires in the near future, he might well have played his last game for the country, in the Champions Trophy final against New Zealand in March 2025.
Shami wasn’t just India’s lead pacer throughout the tournament, he was the only specialist quick in the last three games when Rohit Sharma fielded four spinners. The Champions Trophy was a comeback of sorts for Shami, who had played two One-Day Internationals in the fortnight before the start of the tournament, his only two outings for the country since the 2023 World Cup. By all accounts, it was a triumphant comeback; Shami finished with five for 53 in the tournament opener against Bangladesh and ended up with nine scalps, the joint second most with teammate Varun Chakravarthy and second overall only to Kiwi Matt Henry (10).
In his wildest dreams, Shami wouldn’t have imagined then that he would be surplus to Indian requirements for at least the next 12 months. He was drawn into an unseemly proxy war of words with chief selector Ajit Agarkar in October when the latter said he wasn’t sure if Shami was fully fit and the player countered by thundering that it wasn’t his job to give ‘updates on my fitness’. Which begged the questions: When have selectors relied on players to provide fitness updates? And will they then accept these updates at face value? What are the medical staff there for if the players are required to proclaim their fitness or otherwise?
If those entrusted with decision-making (which has been spectacularly addled in recent times) have chosen to move beyond Shami for whatever reason, the least the pacer deserves is to be told where he stands. Wriddhiman Saha, coincidentally also from Bengal, had revealed in February 2022 that then head coach Rahul Dravid had informed him that the wicketkeeper wouldn’t be considered for national selection henceforth. Harsh as it might have seemed, Saha at least knew what the score was. If Shami’s time in international cricket is history, he needs to be accorded the same respect. After all, he has served the country with great heart and passion for more than a dozen years, boasts 462 international wickets and has invariably been at his best at big-ticket events, punctuated by a tournament-high 24 wickets in the 2023 World Cup even though he was dropped for the first four matches.
Shami has been more of a Test and ODI specialist – he has featured in only 25 T20Is – where his ability to use the seam to devastating effect with the new ball and the propensity to reverse an older ball have been veritable allies. He has been in good wicket-taking form in domestic cricket, reiterating that any concerns surrounding his fitness are ill-founded with a bushel of wickets for Bengal. In the Ranji Trophy, he has bowled more overs (145.2) than any other teammate while picking up 20 wickets in four matches, only left-arm spinner Shahbaz Ahmed (22) ahead of him in the wicket-taking list. He finished the 50-over Vijay Hazare Trophy with 15 wickets from seven outings after having snared another Bengal-high 16 scalps in seven 20-over Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy games. Since the end of August when he played for East Zone in the Duleep Trophy, Shami has delivered 266.3 overs across formats in 19 matches for 52 wickets. If that doesn’t point to fitness and penetration, little else will.
India ready for a life beyond Shami
India have started to invest in other resources beyond Shami in both white-ball formats – Arshdeep Singh, Harshit Rana, Prasidh Krishna – to complement Jasprit Bumrah while in Test cricket, they have tried out Akash Deep and Anshul Kamboj, in addition to Rana and Prasidh. Shami has been looking on balefully from the outer, wondering when, or if, his chance will come.
India’s next Test assignment isn’t until August and in October, they will travel to New Zealand for two further Tests. Will Shami be at least on the latter trip if he continues to stay fit? The next 50-over World Cup is 22 months away; at this point, Rohit, Virat Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja, all older than Shami, are said to be in the mix for the flagship competition. True, batters and spinners have longer shelf lives than a fast bowler, but Shami has done everything he could to prove that he still belongs. Only, those who ought to be paying attention seem not to be, which is a pity because alongside Bumrah, Shami still forms a most lethal combination.