angryangy
ICC Chairman
- Joined
- Oct 1, 2004
Well if you read my post, you'd see I wasn't talking about plans of attack. I was talking about the importance of clever bowling. These things look freakish if you want them to look freakish, but the reality is that the mental game shines through.
Yes, Pietersen scores many runs on the sweep, even against Warne. However, not every ball is a good ball to sweep. Warne created a situation where one of Pietersen's strengths was his undoing. No, you can't just bowl at his legs until he lets one through, but if you are smart, you can convince a batsman to attack a strong ball instead of a weak one.
Likewise, McGrath wasn't simply bowling to get Pietersen in the ribs, but Pietersen kept walking down the pitch and McGrath just used his head, changed the ball at the last moment so that Pietersen was deceived and when he walked into the ball it was still too short for comfort. No, you can't just bowl short until one hits his ribs, but a smart bowler need only find a way to deceive. While Pietersen can dominate by affecting a bowler's length, it was used to lead to his demise.
Finally, if Pietersen decided he would just have a casual swing at a yorker on his first ball, then you have proved my point. He was at that moment playing worse than a junior, again attacking a delivery that doesn't pay to do so.
The point I find myself making again was that if you just try to bowl to a basic plan, Pietersen will probably work it out and exploit it, like any of the best batsmen. These instances are pretty much single use, but all examples of creativity, which is an endless source of answers.
So to summarise, when Sureshot said 'how would you bowl to Pietersen?' my answer is 'you must be able to come up with clever tricks and deceive him'.
