Bangladesh captain Najmul Hossain Shanto was not bothered by Mayank Yadav’s express pace. He said they are used to facing such speed in the nets.
India’s pace sensation Mayank Yadav peppered the speed guns on his international debut, clocking close to 150 km/h in the first T20I against Bangladesh in Gwalior. He hurried the Bangladesh batters with his sheer pace and bounce. What was even more impressive was his lengths – short but not short enough for the batters to line up for the horizontal-bat shots.
Mayank started his international career with a maiden and then even got the wicket of veteran all-rounder Mahmudullah in his next over and if the initial show was anything to go by, then it did appear that Bangladesh batters are in for a hard time in the remaining two matches of the series
However, ask Bangladesh captain Najmul Hossain Shanto about the same and you would get a very different reply. Shanto said they are used to facing such speed in the nets. “We have some similar fast bowlers in the nets. I don’t think we were too worried about (Mayank Yadav). But he is a good bowler,” he said after India won the first T20I by 7 wickets to take a 1-0 lead in the three-match series.
The current Bangladesh T20I squad does not have an out-and-out fast bowler apart from Taskin Ahmed, who clocks speeds of 140+ regularly. But in the Test squad, they did have young Nahid Rana, who nudged the 150 km/h mark.
Coming back to Mayank’s performance, the right-arm pacer was hit for a few boundaries towards the end of the spell when Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Rishad Hossain used his extra pace to ramp it through the third-man region, but overall, he was very impressive. In his four overs, Mayank gave away only 21 runs and picked up one wicket.
He burst onto the scene in IPL 2024, bowling 150 km/h regularly for the Luckno Super Giants before a side strain cut his tournament short. Since then, he has been closely monitored by the BCCI medical team at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru. Sunday’s outing
