5 Bowling actions we tried in our childhood

5. Muttiah Muralitharan

Perhaps one of the most controversial cricketers ever thanks to his ultra-unique action, Muttiah Muralitharan of Sri Lanka divided cricket fraternity into two after he was no-balled in Australia for his bowling action in 1995.

A huge controversy led to him being tested by biomechanics’ expert in Australia itself. He was made to bowl wearing a steel-reinforced plaster cast to show that his elbow didn’t bend beyond the permissible limit. It was just that he was born with a limited ability to bend his elbow and had an extra rubbery wrist. He bowled mostly from his shoulder, giving the ball a flick with his extra flexible wrist, which seen with the naked eye gave the impression that he chucked the ball.

Murali, as he was better known, won the ICC World Cup in 1996 with the Sri Lankan team, had an action that was extremely difficult to copy, but yet, many of us in our childhood tried to copy it, with varying degrees of success. Murali ended his career, which began in 1992 in 2008 with 800 Test wickets in 133 matches, 534 scalps in 350 ODIs- both of which are world-records and even picked 13 T20I matches in 12 matches.