Sunil Narine might not be the man you think he is. The demure, self-effacing cricketer, indifferent to celebrations after nabbing wickets, has three sports cars in his garage, including a Range Rovers that could hit a maximum speed of 234 kph in the blink of an eye, beside four other luxury cards. His face gazes from India’s first live casino and North America’s most trusted optometric firm. He is the unofficial hair-dresser of his Kolkata Knight Riders teammate Andre Russell, the latter says in a podcast on the franchise website. On the dance-floor, he could match the grooves of Russell and Chris Gayle.
He has not been the man you thought he was on the field either. Picked as a mystery spinner for seven million dollars in 2012, a hefty fee that he justified in his first three seasons alone, he is an indiscernible proposition now. He breathes no air of mystery, yet he inspires dread in batsmen. He hardly batted in his first five seasons—faced only 47 balls and collected a pittance of 31 runs, striking a brace of sixes and fours each. In the next seven editions, he would pillage 1,476 runs, at an average strike rate of 155.8. From an exigency pinch-hitting opener, he has transformed into a consistent destroyer in the powerplays.
The two powers had blended powerfully this season. So far, he has smashed 461 runs at a strike rate of 182 and grabbed 15 wickets conceding only 6.63 runs an over. Only seven batsmen have ever managed to plunder 450-plus runs at a strike rate of 175 or more, showing how arduous it is to score fast and score consistently. Thirty nine runs more and he would become the first cricketer in the league to score 500 runs and snare 15 wickets. Only has scored more runs (472) and taken more wickets (17) than Narine in a single episode (2008). Both the figures, though, are within his reach. He has left behind an army of other luminous names, those that are labelled genuine all-rounders. Hardik Pandya, Jacques Kallis and Andrew Symonds, to name but a few. It’s not an aberration either. Twice in the last seven issues has he totalled 350-plus runs; thrice in this span has he pinched 15 wickets or more too.
By the conventional yardsticks, he makes a strong case to be considered a genuine all-rounder. He bends games with the bat; he twists games with the ball. He batters quick runs, belts thrifty overs, scores big runs, snaffles big wickets.
