I never thought I would play for India again: S Sreesanth

By Rahul Bajaj
for Cricketain.com

Published: November 27, 2009

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Kanpur: It’s almost a rebirth for S Sreesanth. After being out of the national side for 19 months, he made a remarkable comeback on the third day of the second test against Sri Lanka ,picking up a five wicket haul and putting his team on the brink of a win. Sreesanth said after his brilliant performance that he had almost given up hope of playing for India again after a series of controversies.

“To be honest, I never thought I will play for the country again. But God has been very kind and I got the opportunity at the right time,” said Sreesanth.

Sreesanth said that this is as good as a re-birth for him since his comeback match is at the same ground (Green Park) where he played his last game 19 months ago. “I played my last Test here and it’s nice to start here again. It’s like a cycle, you go back from here and come back here again,” he said.

It was in 2008 when the Slapgate incident happened — he was slapped by Harbhajan Singh after an IPL match in Mohali, and since then Sreesanth gradually kept going down with controversies and injuries plaguing his career. He was even warned by the BCCI to change his on-field behavior, failing which he could be banned from domestic cricket.

Sreesanth said that he believed he was misunderstood a lot of times. “I think I have been misunderstood a lot of times, not just once or twice. I said in Ahmedabad also that I must be one of the most misunderstood cricketers in the world. But I don’t think I would change. I will do things which are right and not things which people say are right,” he said.

Asked whether he went into the match wanting to silence his critics, Sreesanth said, “I was not proving a point. I was enjoying more and was playing to my expectations. I have become realistic now and set goals which I can achieve. Yes, I was desperate to get the new ball in hand. It’s always a proud moment to play for the country and it was great to open the bowling with Zaheer bhai,” he said.

Remembering his struggling period, Sreesanth said that the time he spent playing county cricket for Warwickshire, where he got to learn the tricks of fast bowling by the legendary Allan Donald, was a very important phase in his career although Donald was always very critical of his approach.

“I think it was a good decision and I thank BCCI for giving me the permission to play county cricket. It was not easy bowling there in June-July. Donald Sir helped me a lot. I know he said certain things about me but he helped me get my focus on off-field things, work on my work ethics, my attitude, training schedule and my professional approach. I have made a lot of sacrifice over the last seven months,” Sreesanth said.

Asked about what he was trying to do different in his bowling, Sreesanth said he just wanted to make the batsmen play as much as possible. “It was a slow track and I had to work hard. Hitting the stumps was more important. I told myself that I might go for runs but I will make them play every ball,” he said.

Of his five scalps in the first innings, Sreesanth said the last one was special, for he often gets impatient for a five-for.

“It has to be (Rangana) Herath’s. It was testing my patience. I was getting irritated at not getting the fifth wicket. In domestic cricket also, I get impatient for that fifth wicket. But I told myself if I can beat him once, I can beat him 10 times also,” he said.

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