10 bowlers from the 90s era who we would have loved to watch in the IPL

#4 Saqlain Mushtaq

Saqlain Mushtaq changed how off-spinner were viewed in world cricket

In the latter half of the 1990s, Saqlain Mushtaq was a key component of Pakistan’s team in both formats. He was the first exponent of the ‘Doosra’ which became a very potent weapon for an off-spinner against batsmen. Later, leading off spinners such as Muttiah Muralitharan and Harbhajan Singh too added this weapon to their arsenal and reaped rich rewards.

Bowling Doosras without significant change in the bowling action fetched Saqlain wickets by the bucketload. He picked up 288 wickets in just 169 ODI matches, which amounts to an incredible 1.70 wickets per match. With a large bag of tricks that can bamboozle any batsman in the world, Saqlain was also mighty effective in the death overs. Had it not been for the overshadowing presence of the legendary Muttiah Muralitharan, Saqlain would have been regarded as the best off spinner of his era.

Considering the success of spinners such as Ravi Chandran Ashwin, Amit Mishra and Sunil Narine in the IPL, it is hard to imagine how a spinner of Saqlain’s variety would not be lethal on the spin-friendly Indian pitches.