Sunrisers Hyderabad fast bowling coach James Franklin shared that they will have to work out how Simarjeet Singh can be fit in the squad following his impressive start – two wickets in the first over as well. However, he was bought for a sum of INR 1.50 Crore in the mega auction in November 2024 as well.
“You know, he’s got some natural pace, he can move the ball through the air and if you’re putting those two things together that obviously becomes quite an attractive skill set for a fast bowler to have and he’s also got a few tricks up his sleeve with slower ball variations,” Franklin said of Simarjeet. “So, yeah, I guess it’s him getting to understand how he fits into our group. Obviously, it’s his first year with us and we’re trying to work out what is the best way to use him.”
“The first game a couple of days ago, that first over was an unbelievable start for him getting us two massive wickets early and to set that tempo for us as a bowling group in that powerplay was massive. So, yeah, hopefully it’s the start of something nice for him and for us,” Franklin further added.
ALSO READ: “Aap Lucknow ke naye nawab hain” – Aakash Chopra on Rishabh Pant’s appointment as LSG captain
Simarjeet Singh is an interesting fit for SRH’s bowling unit as well. Though SRH replaced Bhuvneshwar Kumar and T Natarajan with Mohammed Shami and Harshal Patel, the move needs to work out as well. Simarjeet bowled just one over in the PowerPlay last season, but bowled more of it for CSK in IPL 2022, where MS Dhoni used him out at a stretch against Mumbai Indians, with three of the overs coming in the first six as well.
“Having someone like Simarjit take the new ball definitely helps Pat as a captain. Again, we obviously look at our line-up and the bowling dynamics from game to game and it might not always necessarily be that way. But certainly in that first game it worked beautifully for Pat,” Franklin opined. “When I turned up to training camp a couple of weeks ago, I hadn’t really seen too much of him, seen a bit of footage, but watching him live in the first session that I was here training was awesome to watch,” Franklin said.
“As far as conversations between myself and Simarjit… we’re just getting to understand each other. I’m certainly giving him some free reign at the moment because I just want to see how he operates and what fields he likes to set and how he likes to bowl in different situations of the game. And I’m hoping that through the IPL we’ll obviously talk a lot, converse a lot, bounce around a few ideas on obviously how to evolve and get better because these batting groups that we’re coming up against are incredibly dynamic and powerful. So we have to try and obviously combat that through some creativity and some different ways of thinking on how we can manipulate fields, what sort of balls we use at different stages and obviously how best that suits Simarjit as well and how he wants to bowl,” James Franklin concluded.
