WATCH: Ridiculous! Sunil Narine bowling a maiden in a Super Over
Sunil Narine has a rich legacy as a T20 bowler. The experienced mystery spinner has now taken a whopping 425 wickets to his name in all domestic T20s with an economy rate of only 6.04.
Narine has shined the brightest with his performances in the IPL for Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR). The 33-year-old has picked up 143 wickets from his 134 IPL games while conceding only 6.74 runs per over. He has been pivotal to KKR’s title-winning campaigns in 2012 and 2014.
There have been hiccups along the way, including being questions for the legality of his action, but Narine has always come back stronger from the setbacks. He did the same recently in the UAE leg of the IPL 2021, taking 13 scalps with an economy of just 6.22. The indecipherable tweaker was instrumental in KKR’s revival and helped them reach the final.
But while Sunil Narine’s IPL record is undoubtedly great, even he wouldn’t contest that perhaps his greatest and most remarkable moment as a bowler came back home in the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) where he once delivered a Super Over maiden.
Sunil Narine is one of the greatest bowlers in the history of T20 cricket.
When Sunil Narine nailed it to perfection in the Super Over
That perfect over came during the 2014 edition of the CPL. Playing for the Guyana Amazon Warriors, Sunil Narine not only successfully defended the 12 runs that the then Trinidad & Tobago Red Steel required but went onto bowl a maiden, conceding no run off his six deliveries.
What a super over performance this was from Sunil Narine. @CPL pic.twitter.com/XpCH6BY6mg
— Bowled Mate. (@BowledMate_) June 27, 2020
Narine bowled as many as five of his six deliveries to the talented West Indies batter Nicholas Pooran who, despite many backing him to nail a couple of sixes and tilt the scales in his team’s favour, looked helpless as the mystery spinner nailed one dot ball after another.
Recognising the dry, spin-friendly nature of the track, Narine focused on bowling into the surface and turned the ball viciously past Pooran’s willow on four successive occasions. The only time Pooran managed to connect a stroke, he ended up skying the ball straight to the long-off fielder.
Narine then bowled another dot ball against Ross Taylor to complete his perfect maiden over.