“I would have played one more Test if it was there” - Mohammed Siraj when asked about his workload in the Anderson Tendulkar Trophy

Indian star pacer Mohammed Siraj, who ended the Anderson Tendulkar Trophy as the leading wicket-taker with 23 scalps, has stated that he would've played one more Test if it were scheduled in the series.

Notably, India levelled the England tour 2-2 in the five-match series, which was Shubman Gill’s first-ever series as a Test captain. While the Indian pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah was part of only three out of five Tests on the tour, Siraj went on to play all five Tests, emerging as the lone pacer to do so from both sides.

“Shubman Gill asked me, ‘Kaisi hai teri body?’ (How is your body?). I said, ‘Ekdum first-class’. He asked me if I would play. I said yes. He said, you are the main bowler for us, like Jasprit Bumrah, you decide. I said I’m available and am 100 per cent fit. I will give it everything. As for my body being tired, to be honest, I would have played one more Test if it was there. I didn’t feel tired. But I was in a zone. When you enter that zone, you don’t know what you are doing, but just have that feeling that I have to do something here,” Siraj said to The Indian Express in an exclusive conversation.

In the fifth and final Test at The Oval, in Bumrah’s absence, Siraj stepped up as the lead pacer, scalping a nine-wicket haul in the match to propel India to a narrow six-run win as India levelled the series 2-2. Siraj strolled down the memory lane to relive the moments. 

“It was a script written for me from somewhere up there. From getting bowled in Lords (the Test that India lost), then reaching Oval. Then I took a catch (of Harry Brook) and touched the boundary. Everything was written for me. It was a script from God. When I woke up on that final morning, they needed 35 runs,” he added.

“I told myself that this game wouldn’t go beyond an hour and that I will win this match. The match was to start at 11 am and the team bus would leave by 9 am. I woke up at 6 am! I asked myself, ‘Why did I wake up so early today?’ I had woken up suddenly. After that, I wrote down, ‘I can do this, win the game’. When the ball came out of my hand, the execution was exactly how I was thinking; it’s a good sign. God had written, ‘Ja hero ban ja tu, become a hero’.” Siraj concluded.

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