Fact-Check: Mohammed Siraj Bowls 181.6 Kmph Delivery In Adelaide Test

The speed gun at Adelaide Oval recorded that India’s star bowler Mohammed Siraj bowled a ball at 181.6 km/h, making it the fastest delivery ever in cricket history.

Mohammed Siraj couldn’t take any wickets for his team on Day 1 of the Adelaide Test, even though he bowled under the lights with the pink ball.

Speed Gun Error in IND vs AUS Adelaide Test

He started well, putting pressure on the Australian openers with his lines, lengths, and aggression. However, he didn’t manage to get any wickets in the 10 overs he bowled.

Overall, Siraj bowled three maiden overs and gave away 29 runs, with an economy rate of 2.90.

In the 25th over, Siraj surprised everyone with his pace. On the last ball of the over, he bowled a short delivery to Marnus Labuschagne down the leg side, which the batter let go. As Siraj was walking back after the delivery, the speed gun showed it was an 181.6 km/h ball.

If that was accurate, it would have been the fastest ball in cricket history, breaking the current record of 161.3 km/h held by Pakistan’s Shoaib Akhtar.

However, it turned out to be a major technical error from the official broadcaster, and Siraj’s delivery wasn’t actually 181.6 km/h.

Watch: Mohammed Siraj hits 181.6 km/h as speed gun makes an error –

Yeaaa pic.twitter.com/2RxhrKVQZ3

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In the same 25th over, Mohammed Siraj got angry before the 5th ball when Marnus Labuschagne stopped at the last moment because he was distracted by a fan holding a beer snake near the sight screen.

This made Siraj very upset, and he threw the ball towards the batter to show his frustration, while also saying a few angry words.

Speaking on Star Sports, batting legend Cheteshwar Pujara gave his thoughts on Day 1 of the pink-ball Test between India and Australia in Adelaide.

Pujara praised veteran Australian left-arm seamer Mitchell Starc for his outstanding 6-wicket haul and advised the Indian bowlers to bowl full-length deliveries to have success in the match. He said:

“I would like to talk about Mitchell Starc’s bowling; he took 6 wickets, and for the first time, he took 5 wickets against India. He bowled brilliantly and bowled the deliveries at full length.

“Meanwhile, Indian bowlers tried to bowl back-of-length deliveries. There very few deliveries were bowled in the length of 4 to 6 meters. Between 6 and 8 meters, they bowled more. So they’ll have to bowl full if they want to come back in this match and will have to take wickets.

“And to take wickets, top-of-off bowling is very important. And there, the bowlers have not bowled a lot on the stump lines. So I think they need to bowl on stumps and take wickets as soon as possible.”

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