Bowlers with unorthodox bowling actions in modern Cricket

People say Cricket is a batsman's game. Most of the rule changes are tilted in the favor of batsmen, which limits the scope of the bowlers.

Having said that, Cricket has seen some exceptional bowlers. Some with flawless action and some with unorthodox action.

Such bowlers become hard to predict for the batsmen.

Over the years we have witnessed some legendary bowlers with unusual action like Paul Adams, Lasith Malinga, Muttiah Muralitharan and so on.

This unorthodox bowling action is inherited to modern cricket also. Here are a few bowlers with unusual bowling actions.

---

#4 Jasprit Bumrah

Bumrah recently made his debut in Tests for India

It was former Indian coach John Wright, who spotted him in Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy and drafted him into the Mumbai Indians squad.

For so long, India had struggled for a death over specialist. Bumrah certainly ended this grapple with his ability to bowl inch-perfect yorkers in death overs. He can contain and pick wickets at the same time.

With an abnormal, unorthodox action and natural pace, the peculiar release point of his deliveries makes it hard for batsmen to pick him.

Bumrah helped Mumbai Indians to win many close encounters with his accurate bowling. It is quite a task to defend 11 runs in a super over with Brendon McCullum and Aaron Finch on the crease.

The latest entrant to the Indian Test side is certainly a valuable addition to the Indian squad and no surprise that he is now the No.1 ranked ODI bowler in ICC rankings.

#3 Kedhar Jadhav

Kedar Jadhav gets low to deliver the ball.

The part-time wicketkeeper turned all-rounder for India has a unique style of delivering the ball.

With two left-handers Jimmy Neesham and Tom Latham at the crease, and no off-spinners in the playing eleven, it was Dhoni who opted to bowl Jadav during the New Zealand tour of India in 2016 which took everyone by surprise.

But Dhoni being the captain that he was did pull a rabbit out of the hat.

Jadav grabbed eyeballs with his peculiar side-arm bowling action, He ended up picking six wickets in that series against the Blackcaps.

Jadhav has done a solid job for Virat Kohli by running through with overs and also picking up wickets in the middle overs which adds extra support to India's spinning arsenal.

"Jadav never tried bowling in domestic circuits", admits his former Maharastra Ranji team captain Swapnil Gugale.

So, it is very much evident that this experiment to bowl him was one of the unwritten rule in Dhoni's success diary and it seems like it has clicked big time.

#2 Shivil Kaushik

Kaushik's action was similar to Paul Adams

Shivil Kaushik caught everyone's attention after he made his IPL debut for the Gujarat Lions. Within few minutes, after delivering his first ball, Kaushik took the internet by storm.

People started comparing him with the Legendary South African chinaman bowler Paul Adams.

In fact, Adams himself took the twitter and congratulated this unorthodox wonder kid from Bengaluru.

Kaushik's bowling action was the talk of the town during IPL 2016. Batsmen admitted that there is a sense of unpredictability with his bowling and also claimed that the ball was released in a weird position which makes it difficult to read the line.

His KPL side's coach said, "the most remarkable thing about his bowling is that sometimes it comes out as a chinaman, sometimes googly and at other times just whips through as a top spinner. He himself confesses that he doesn’t know which one will turn which way."

Kaushik emerged as the winner of the talent hunt for spinners conducted by former Indian spinner Anil Kumble's company Tenvic in Bengaluru.

He was picked by Hubli tigers for Rs.60,000 in Karnataka Premier League. After playing for numerous domestic franchises, Kaushik was then scalped by Gujarat Lions at his base price of Rs.10 lakh in IPL 2016.

Kaushik was unsold in this year's IPL auction, but this young talent has the potential to make it big and he is just 22 years old with so many years of cricket still left in him.

#1 Kevin Koththigoda

Kevin Koththigoda has been using this bowling style from his childhood

Sri Lanka's 18-year-old mystery leg-spinner, Kevin Koththigoda, is the latest addition to the list of unorthodox bowling.

The Sri Lankan teenager caught everyone's attention during the U-19 Asia cup held at Malaysia.

Koththigoda, who is from Unawatuna, a town in Sri Lanka near Galle, has been bowling with this action right from his childhood.

Former Sri Lanka A opener Dhammika Sudarshana, who coached him during his school days, said that the action came naturally to Koththigoda. "He has a very unusual action. It’s like that of Paul Adams. The action wasn’t coached or anything, it came naturally to him. Initially, he was struggling with the length as he couldn’t see the pitch, but he has improved tremendously", Sudharshana said in one of his interviews.

Koththigoda is an excellent fielder and a decent batsman. If he can get good control over his action, there is no doubt that he can go on to become an incredible asset for Sri Lanka, just like the brilliant spin bowlers they have produced in the past.