Sri Lanka Cricket / Frank Gregan / 09 May 2011 / 1

This year's IPL has again shown what a genius Lasith Malinga is with the ball, says Frank Gregan

The top of the leading wicket taker table in this year's Indian Premier League is heavily congested. Only three dismissals separate the 16 players that occupy slots two-17 on the chart. It looks like it will go right down to the wire to determine who is the second best bowler in IPL4.

The list reads like a Who's Who of international cricket. Dale Steyn, Shane Warne, Albie Morkel, Doug Bollinger and Harbhajan Singh are just five of the crowd vying for the runners up spot.

The reason that they are all gunning for second place is because one guy is in a class all of his own. Lasith Malinga is that far ahead of the field he is lapping some of the bowlers at the bottom! He's that far ahead, the pack couldn't catch him in Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull!

The Sri Lankan has taken an incredible 24 wickets in just 39 overs for the Mumbai Indians. His nearest rival (Rahul Sharma of the Pune Warriors) has 13 wickets to his name and is more likely to catch Usain Bolt than Malinga.

Lasith recently announced his retirement from Test cricket. There is speculation that he was hurt by criticism of his participation in the IPL having withdrawn from Sri Lanka's tour of England due to injury problems. Quitting Test cricket will prolong his one day career (cries of rearrange tail, wag and dog from the purists!) which will secure his financial future.

Malinga has had to learn some difficult fiscal lessons courtesy of poor treatment at the hands of Sri Lanka Cricket who denied him a national contract in 2008 when he was injured. On returning from injury he was initially awarded a reduced contract but the Mumbai Indians have always stood by him.

He has a degenerative knee condition that can't stand up to the rigours of Test cricket but he will be available for his country's one day fixtures. He is regarded by many as the finest one day bowler in the world and to focus on limited over cricket seems to be a sensible decision. In the short term he will continue to lead the Sri Lankan one day attack but surely there is a future in the game for the mop headed paceman as a bowling coach.

Sri Lanka Cricket would do well to keep Malinga onside. His distinctive action has seen more investigations than the CSI team but it's highly effective and if he is able to pass on his knowledge and technique to a new generation of Sri Lankan bowlers, they will be a force on the international circuit for many years to come. Imagine a pace attack of four Malinga clones hurling down yorkers with the arm at right angles. Scary!

Standing at the bar having a quick one on the way home from work, millions of us offer sage advice to the batsmen who are tap dancing in effort to avoid their toes being broken by yet another Malinger the Slinger yorker delivered at the death. "Get down the track, turn it into a full toss and whack it over the leg-side boundary!" a mate of mine shouted out the other day.

Yeah, good luck with that. Malinga is a wily old fox, he'd see the batsman coming and would dig it in short and re-arrange the batsman's rib-cage! It's a bit of a no brainer - broken toe or broken ribs? Most of us would elect to tap dance!

Malinga's Mumbai Indians still head the IPL market at [2.36] to lift the trophy but the Royal Challengers of Bangalore have shortened considerably and are now in to [5.5]) due to Chris Gayle's dominance with the bat. What a final that would make, a classic bat v ball between Gayle and Malinga.

There's a lot of cricketing life left in Lasith Malinga but when he does retire let's hope he stays in the game. Here's a thought, he could become an umpire and consequently a headline writers dream. Malinga the Slinger becomes Malinga the Finger!

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1. Mahesh | 10 May 2011

   Well you may not known this fact.He was ignored by the central contract due to disciplinary issues caused during that time.make sure you don't write things in future without inquiring

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