Mumbai

Former India batsman Virender Sehwag blasted Sunrisers Hyderabad pacer Umran Malik for not knowing his bowling length despite working with South African great Dale Steyn for long enough.

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Sehwag's comments came on the back of yet another poor performance by SRH bowlers where they once again failed to defend 200 runs.

“You can only win by dismissing those batters. (Markram had kept) Fine leg, square leg, and deep midwicket, and asked the bowler to bowl a back-of-the-length delivery. But the batters didn't make a mistake. SRH took the chance, but the batters smashed them all around the park,” Sehwag said in a chat with Cricbuzz.

Also Read: 'I am playing my best:' Virat Kohli hits back after criticism over strike rate

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"The bowlers weren't pretty good. The captain could've asked them to keep one of long-on and long-off. The thing was, you failed to stop the flow of runs altogether.

“If it were a South African pacer, I could've understood that he wouldn't want to bowl too full. But Umran Malik... the problem is that he keeps shuffling his length. He doesn't have the experience yet. He might have worked a lot with Dale Steyn, but he hasn't really got the idea of his length. Despite working with Steyn for so long and learning under him, he's doing the same mistakes that he did last year,” the former batsman added.

Notably, Umran Malik had a brilliant 2022 where he took 22 wickets in 14 matches but the pacer couldn't replicate his success in 2023. The speedster could only take five wickets in eight matches of IPL 2023. Malik not being part of Playing XI in many matches this season also raised a lot of eyebrows and skipper Aiden Markram's was criticised a lot as well for giving a vague answer to the situation.

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Markram, in the match prior to MI, had said that there's something wrong but doesn't know what when asked about Umran's absence from the SRH playing XI in several matches this season. Hderabad finished last in 2023 among 10 teams with eight points, having won only four out of 14 matches.

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