Whenever we speak about Indian cricket, the batters come to the fore. The likes of Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar, Rohit Sharma, Rahul Dravid, and many other stalwarts come to mind. India though at one point was known as the land of the best spin bowlers in the world.
After the domination of the quartet of spin bowlers in the 1970s and 1980s, the landscape changed when Kapil Dev came to the fore. The likes of Javagal Srinath, Zaheer Khan, and Irfan Pathan soon dominated the headlines.
Just when it seemed that Indian spin was being shouldered by Anil Kumble alone, Harbhajan Singh came along and changed the landscape once more. For nearly two decades Harbhajan Singh wasn’t at the forefront of spin bowling for India and won many games.
Harbhajan Singh: A mammoth match-winner
When Harbhajan Singh made his debut the Indian spin department was dominated by Anil Kumble. To give him support there were Venkatapathy Raju and Rajesh Chauhan. Under the captaincy of Mohammad Azharuddin the Indian team went in with 3 spinners at home.
After his debut in 1998, Harbhajan Singh played just 8 Test matches till 2001 when he earned a re-call into the Indian side. Still only 20, he tormented the Aussie batting line-up with 32 wickets and became an instant hero. His duels with Ricky Ponting in particular began in 1998 when he was embroiled in a rather nasty stand-off with the future Aussie skipper.
His best moment came in Kolkata where he became the first ever Indian bowler to pick a hat trick in Test cricket. From there on he didn’t look back as he became the backbone of the next generation of Indian captains across formats home and away.
After a lull in form, Harbhajan Singh played a pivotal role in the 2007 T20 World Cup win. His spell in the semi-final win over Australia is still spoken to this day as the best the world has seen.
His biggest moment came during the 2011 World Cup semi-final vs Pakistan playing in front of his home crowd. Umar Akmal was batting well and Pakistan were mounting a fight back. The first ball after the second drinks break, Bhajji as he fondly called came round the wicket and hit the top of Umar Akmal’s off-stump. The stunned Pakistani batter had no clue what happened as Harbhajan Singh celebrated with glee.
Once the World Cup was won, Harbhajan Singh known to wear his emotion on his sleeve was seen crying. The same year he picked his 400th test wicket during the tour of West Indies which was sadly his last huge flash in international cricket. The emergence of Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, and the presence of Amit Mishra and Pragyan Ojha meant that Bhajji was never considered a sure starter.
His career for India ended in 2016 but by then he had done a lot more with the ball and with the bat to cement his legendary status.