'He kept it simple': Former India coach Paras Mhambrey decodes Mohammed Shami's success

Former India bowling coach Paras Mhambrey reflects on what made Mohammed Shami one of India’s greatest fast bowlers.Excerpts:Q: You worked closely with Mohammed Shami for several years. What, in your view, was his greatest skill as a fast bowler?Paras Mhambrey: A couple of things stand out. First and foremost was his seam presentation. Very few bowlers in world cricket have had that kind of upright seam position. As a batter, you never quite knew whether the ball would come in or go away after pitching. He kept asking questions of you every delivery. I’ve seen very few bowlers who could do it as consistently as Shami. S Sreesanth was one. After that, Shami stands out. The other thing was his simplicity. He wasn’t overly data-driven or information-heavy. He kept things very simple. He knew exactly what he wanted from a session and what he needed to do to prepare for a game. That clarity really stood out.Q: Was he one of the more self-sufficient bowlers you worked with? Did he require very little technical intervention?Mhambrey: At that level, most established fast bowlers have already figured out their technique. The technical work is usually done when they’re younger and still developing. With Shami, as with most senior bowlers, our conversations were more tactical than technical. He had a fair idea about batters and game plans. Sometimes it was just about discussing a couple of finer points or reinforcing something he already knew. The role of a coach was often to put certain thoughts in front of him and let him process them. He was very experienced and very aware of his own game.Q: What was unique about the way Shami trained and prepared?Mhambrey: He was never a gym-first cricketer. In fact, if memory serves me right, I hardly ever saw him spending long hours in the gym. Of course, he worked on fitness, but he was primarily skill-driven. For him, the most important thing was bowling. He would bowl a lot because he understood that was what sharpened his skill, gave him confidence and improved his control.He belonged more to the old-school generation of fast bowlers who believed that if you wanted to become a better bowler, you had to bowl more. I think that’s one of the biggest reasons for his success.Q: Why was he so effective in India, where conditions generally favour spin bowlers?Mhambrey: He surprised people with his pace. He was much quicker than many batters realised.He wasn’t someone who sprinted into the crease, but he had excellent rhythm and could reproduce that rhythm ball after ball. Batters often underestimated his speed through the air.That’s why you saw so many bowled and lbw dismissals. By the time batters adjusted to the pace of the wicket or the bowler, he had already hurried them into making a mistake.He wasn’t a 150 kmph bowler, but he was definitely quicker than people gave him credit for.Q: He earned the tag of ‘Second-Innings Shami’. What made him even more dangerous as a match progressed?Mhambrey: Accuracy. His ability to hit the same length and the same channel over and over again.Add to that the seam position. As a batter, you could see the seam standing upright but still didn’t know whether the ball would come in or go away. That uncertainty is what made him so dangerous.That’s why he picked up so many bowled and lbw wickets throughout his career.Q: Were you surprised he didn’t get another opportunity in Test cricket after returning to domestic cricket and performing well?Mhambrey: Personally, I would have loved to see him represent India again, in Test cricket and in other formats as well. He’s played Ranji Trophy cricket, he’s done well and, honestly, he’s simply a joy to watch. Sometimes you sit in the dressing room and watch him bowl and he makes everything look so easy.Having said that, we’re not privy to the conversations he may have had with the selectors or the team management. There may have been discussions we don’t know about. Shami would know that better than anybody else. But as someone who has watched him closely, I would certainly have loved to see him play more Test cricket.Q: Any training-ground memory that captures his competitiveness?Mhambrey: I remember one session at the NCA after he had returned from rehab. We were practising on the Chinnaswamy side wickets in Bengaluru. I don’t remember who the batter was, but what struck me was the pace and bounce he generated almost effortlessly. He wasn’t even running at full tilt, yet the batter was clearly uncomfortable.When you watch him from close quarters, you realise how quick he is off the wicket. The seam movement, the bounce, the pace: it was unbelievable. That session reminded me why batters hated facing him in the nets.Q: Has cricket become too reliant on fitness metrics and not enough on actual bowling workloads and performances?Mhambrey: Every generation is different, but if you look at Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ishant Sharma or Umesh Yadav, they all bowled a lot. That generation developed skill through workload. Fitness was important, but it was a supplement to bowling, not a substitute for it. If you want control, you need to bowl. If you want to know your limits and understand your body, you need to bowl. That’s how you discover your threshold and learn how much extra effort you can produce when the team needs it.These bowlers knew their bodies because they had put in the work over many years. Ishant played more than 100 Tests not because he bowled a few overs in the nets. He bowled thousands of overs over the course of his career. That’s the lesson for young fast bowlers. Skill remains the primary requirement. The more you bowl, the better you understand your craft, your body and your game.Get the latest Sports News and Live updates. Download the TOI app.