We should have had a spinner: Shami

India’s decision to go with a four-pronged pace attack at the expense of a specialist spinner had come under heavy criticism and paceman Mohammad Shami lent weight to those views by saying “there should have been a spinner.”

India wrong read the green-top surface which has gone on to assist the spin as well. Aussie off-spinner Nathan Lyon already has seven wickets with a chance to go at five more batsmen from India who are reeling at 112/5 in chase of 287 for a win here on Monday. Even part-time spinner Hanuma Vihari claimed two wickets on the opening day.

“The team management makes these decisions,” said Shami after the fourth day’s play of the second Test when asked if the Indian attack missed a spinner. “We can’t do anything about it. We had one spinner (Vihari) who didn’t bowl badly. He bowled (well). If you ask me, I feel there should have been a spinner, but these things depend on your (team) management,” he added for a good measure.

Indian bowlers went wicketless in the first session despite beating the bats of Tim Paine and Usman Khawaja times without number but post-lunch it was as though they were bowling on a different surface. Shami claimed 4/26 in seven overs to return his best Test figures (6/56) in an innings.   

“Sometimes when you have a partnership, you have to wait, especially on a wicket like this where we were beating them again and again,” he offered. “It wasn’t as if we were bowling bad, but even after bowling good lengths we were not getting wickets. As soon as we got a wicket, the momentum changed, and we used it.

“You can see, (for the) first two days the wicket was very good. But the third day it is going a little up and down and there is uneven bounce as well. And the ball is keeping low at times. But it is like a normal Perth wicket and that’s how it has played so far. It is in everybody’s mind that on days 3 and 4 there will be some up and down and we are getting to see that so far,” he explained.