Harbhajan changes 'patka' for better luck

MOLAHI: Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh donned a cream-coloured patka (turban) during the second Test here instead of the black he always wears, hoping the change will improve his performance.

The change was due to a superstition and in the hope of getting out of the poor spell, revealed a source close to the 25-year-old Punjab bowler. Harbhajan bowled in his usual black patka on the first two truncated days of the match on Thursday and Friday and then switched to the cream-coloured cloth on Saturday.

It was perhaps only the second time in his career that the spinner wore a patka other than black, and first time since the second Test against Pakistan at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata in 2005.

Harbhajan had gone wicket-less for a long period of time before that Kolkata Test in which he claimed four victims. “Someone in Kolkata told me that I should switch over to a cream-coloured patka, and I got two wickets after changing it,” Harbhajan is believed to have told one of his friends.

In the first innings of that Test Harbhajan had returned figures of 30-6-94-2, and in the second his bowling analysis read 30.3-16-51-2. In the ongoing Mohali Test, Harbhajan was given only 12 overs in the England first innings as Anil Kumble took five wickets to cross the 500-mark. Harbhajan, on the other hand, failed to take a single wicket and ended with figures of 12-0-31-0. The spinner has been struggling for wickets since scalping 10 batsmen to spin India to victory in the third Test against Sri Lanka in Ahmedabad in December.