Kashmir kid bowls ‘ball of the century’, gets praised by Shane Warne

Cricketers from the state of Jammu and Kashmir do not always get the opportunity to fulfil their sky-high aspirations but the rich talent that the state possesses for the game also gets the much-needed exposure at times. We had one such exposure recently and the cricketer in news was a seven-year-old kid, standing only two-and-half-feet tall. The boy produced such a “ball of the century” in a local game that even a stalwart like Shane Warne couldn’t hold himself back from praising it.

It can be mentioned here that it is the former Australian spin wizard who has the distinction of bowling the ‘ball of the century’ (20th though) against former England batsman Mike Gatting in a Test match at Old Trafford in 1993. The ball had pitched quite outside the leg stump but spun all the way back to rattle the seasoned batter’s off stump. Warne, who was just a year or so old in international cricket then, had announced what a special talent he was.

Kashmir’s 7-year-old boy bowls an incredible delivery

Twenty-five years since that incredible delivery, it was time for another ‘ball of the century’ (21st century) though produced by a less-known by specially talented kid spinner. A tweet surfaced showing the bowler rubbing the ball onto his white trousers and then delivering a ball with an action which is a blending of that of ace Indian spinner Harbhajan Singh and former South African mystery spinner Paul Adams.

The ball pitched a metre and half outside the leg stump of the left-hand batsman, also a kid, and then took a turn of the century to hit the stumps. The bowler and his teammates over ecstatic to see the feat. The incident is a few months old and the tweet with the video of the bowling was shared by a Kashmir-based journalist who called it the “ball of the century”. The journalist, Mufti Islah, also tagged Warne in the tweet and it caught the latter’s eyes only recently.

Here is the video:

It was later known that the kid who bowled the special delivery is Ahmad from Kashmir’s Ganderbal district.

The issue also came up for discussion during the second day of the ongoing Australia-India Test match in Adelaide and Warne was asked by the anchor whether Ahmad bowled the ball of the 21st century after the Australian had bowled the ball of the 20th century.

“Yeah, lucky man! That was sensational and cute!” Warne replied with a smile.

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