Sri Lanka unearth mystery spinner during U-19 Asia Cup

  Sri Lanka unearthed yet another mystery bowler during the under-19 tournament by the name of Kevin Koththigoda, who bowls like the right-handed version of former South Africa chinaman bowler Paul Adams, who was nicknamed ‘frog in the blender’ for the unique way of contorting his body while bowling.

Paul Adams, the former South African chinaman bowler, was nicknamed ‘Frog in the blender’ as his whole body would contort in a weird way to deliver his left-arm legbreaks. Adams’ action has spurred yet another bowler to copy his action. Indian chinaman bowler Shivil Kaushik, who played for Gujarat Lions in the Indian Premier League, also has an action modelled on him.

Now, there is yet another addition to the ‘frog in the blender’ list. His name is Kevin Koththigoda, an 18-year-old legspinner from Unawatuna, a town near Galle.

However, unlike Adams, Koththigoda is a right-arm legspinner and was a major talking point in the Asia Cup U-19 tournament in Kuala Lumpur. Sri Lanka took on Afghanistan and Koththigoda’s bowling action was the major talking point. He finished with figures of 8-0-29-1 as Sri Lanka’s U-19 team defeated Afghanistan U-19 by 61 runs.

Koththigoda’s action was nurtured by Dhammika Sudarshana at Richmond College. Speaking to cricbuzz.com, Sudarshana, a former Sri Lanka A opener said, “The action wasn’t coached or anything, it came naturally to him. Initially, he was struggling with the length as he couldn’t see the pitch, but he has improved.”

Koththigoda has had a decent start to his under-19 career and Sri Lanka will be watching this youngster carefully in the coming years.

- Hindustan Times