Playing alongside Suresh Raina in the IPL was helpful, says Basil Thampi

23-year-old pacer Basil Thampi impressed one and all in the tenth edition of the Indian Premier League in which he played for the Gujarat Lions. But he has specifically came to limelight after MRF Pace Academy’s Director – the all-time bowling stalwart Glenn McGrath heaped praises on Thampi, who trains at the Chennai-based MRF academy. McGrath, among other young bowlers in the academy, singled out Thampi as the one to look out for.

Three bowlers from the pace academy have been chosen for India A tour to South Africa – Thampi, Aniket Chowdhury (who played for the Royal Challengers Bangalore) and Ankit Rajpoot (who played for the Kolkata Knight Riders). Speaking to Yahoo Cricket, the young Kerala bowler recalled his first ever IPL delivery, which was to Sunrisers Hyderabad opener David Warner.

“Every bowler wants to bowl to top batsmen like Warner, Gayle and Kohli. Earlier, I used to keep dreaming about bowling to these guys. My first ball in IPL was to Warner. It was a pressure situation and my throat and lips went dry. After that I realized I was good enough to play at this level. Now I have no fear in bowling to anybody.” Thampi told.

Life after IPL

When asked on how his life changed after his maiden stint with the IPL, which enjoys tremendous craze in the country, Thampi, who bowls at 140 kmph, said that playing with Suresh Raina, who was the captain of Gujarat Lions, helped him a lot.

“With God’s grace I played in the Syed Mushtaq Ali trophy and the games were shown live on TV. People could see I was regularly bowling at 140 kmph. In the IPL, Raina helped me a lot. It’s tough for a youngster to play 12 matches in his first season, but thanks to the management and support staff it was no trouble at all. It was great to have all these legends working with me,” Thampi added.