In the 16th match of Tamil Nadu Premier League 2022 played between Salem Spartans and Madurai Panthers, former Sri Lankan pacer Lasith Malinga’s action bowler Raghupati Silmberson bowled brilliantly. He took 4 wickets for 22 runs in 4 overs. His performance helped Madurai Panthers win by 39 runs. This fast bowler came into the limelight after performing brilliantly in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. The life of this fast bowler with slinga action has been a struggle.
Like Malinga, Raghupati also bowls from the side. Due to this, the batsmen find it very difficult to play them. Not only cricket, he has also excelled in studies. He topped high school. After this he also did a diploma in electrical and electronics engineering. When he had come from Chennai to play league cricket, his team had just paid him the fare. Since then he kept on moving forward.
Raghupati Silambarasan hails from Sendirkilai village in Tamil Nadu district. His parents did not have any big business. Nor was his family wealthy. They used to work as daily wage labourers. In such a situation, it was not easy for the player to remain active in this field. The upper caste children of the village did not allow him to play with them. This was disclosed by the fast bowler himself while talking to the New Indian Express newspaper.
Talking about this Raghupati Silmberson said, “They did not take me along. I didn’t understand at that time. In such a situation, I used to play with an old rubber ball by taking a branch of a coconut tree. I loved hitting the ball. But there was no one to throw the ball. Once I got tired of hitting the ball, I ran and threw the ball. Then did this until there was a need to take a break. Seeing this, the people of the village thought that I had gone mad. ,
During that time when some children saw Raghupati Silmberson playing alone, they gave him a chance to play together because of the talent. His bowling pace was very fast. After this, there was often a fight between two teams to include him in their team. The reason behind this was his bowling action like Lasith Malinga.
Interestingly, when Malinga made his debut, the bowler’s younger brother saw him bowling on TV. He told Silmberson about it. The brother told him about Malinga’s bowling action and said, “I can’t play his ball. I also found it difficult to touch the ball. So I started practicing bowling in the same way and soon I started bowling in this action. After that started playing the match with the same action. Then the news of my action spread throughout the district. ,
Surprisingly, Raghupati had never seen a live match on TV till the age of 16. During this, when M Karunanidhi was the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, the government distributed TV and after that he watched the live match. He recalled the moment he was shocked to see Malinga bowling. Describing it, he said, “I saw Tendulkar bat for the first time in 2009. Till then I had only seen them in photographs in newspapers. When the government gave us TV, the first thing I did was take a cable connection and when I saw Malinga, I thought my action could go on.