T20 World Cup 2022: Josh Hazlewood - the best current T20I bowler in the world, the least celebrated

The Cricket world has celebrated Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins to a great level for their deadly lethal bowling. But Josh Hazlewood has been a silent and consistent performer for the team, giving results every time he balls.

He has historically been never looked at as a world-class T20I bowler, even when there are not many better bowlers than him.

Roller coaster journey for Josh Hazlewood

The bowler had a roller coaster journey. Cricket Australia didn't give him any T20 international games for almost four years between 2016 and 20220. But then Indian Premier League 2021 became his turning point.

Chennai Super Kings roped in the bowler, and with MS Dhoni as captain, he gave an exceptional performance proving his worth which took the attention of Australian cricket.

And since then, he has been a permanent member of Australia's T20I squad. 

He got first in the ICC T20I bowlers rank when he took four wickets against Sri Lanka. He became the first Australian bowler to be crowned the world's number one T20I bowler since Nathan Bracken in 2008. 

A disciplined bowler on top with persistence

Earlier Josh Hazlewood has never considered a bowler fit for shorter formats. For shorter formats, a bowler needs multiple variations to trick any batter; thus, bowlers with variations were considered more successful than the classic bowler. 

Also, he is not someone who could dig variations like Dwayne Bravo or Harshal Patel. He also doesn't possess the pace of Anrich Nortje or Kagiso Rabada. 

He is often seen hitting the deck hard on his intended line and on that three-quarter length (also known as the test match length in T20s) with a pace close to the 140 kmph mark.

In these T20 formats, everyone expects an unpredictable bowler to be successful. However, if you look at Josh Hazelwood, despite being predictable, proved that the test match lengths, when executed with perfection, can be more than handy in the 20-over format.

The hard lengths are likely to go for runs on wickets which don't offer much assistance making it big trouble for any batsman. 

Skipper Aaron Finch said, "I think with the ball when Josh Hazlewood is bowling such consistent lengths we know as batters how hard it is to face that." 

Since 2021, Hazelwood has not just been a consistent performer across different phases in the shortest format but also bowled game-breaking spells. In his 37 T20I matches, he has clinched 53 wickets at an average and economy rate of 19.94 and 7.62, respectively.

He has proven to be both a strike weapon and a death specialist at the international level in recent times. Revealing his success in the shortest format, the bowler said, "Just learning what to bowl at what times to what batters. I think doing that planning before the games and knowing who's who, where their strengths are and where to bowl (is crucial)."

Praising the bowler, Aakash Chopra said, "People might say that Starc will pick up the most wickets for Australia. But I feel it will be Hazlewood. He bowls on hard lengths and is accurate even when the batters attack him. On his day, Starc will pick four wickets. But Hazlewood can consistently keep on picking 2-3 wickets every game."

Though being amongst the least celebrated bowlers for Australia, he is highly likely to emerge as one of the leading wicket-takers for the team in the World Cup.