Sky Cricket Masterclass: Sri Lanka great Muttiah Muralitharan demonstrates spin bowling

Watch a Sky Sports Cricket Masterclass every Tuesday on skysports.com over next few weeks

Watch part one of our Sky Sports Cricket Masterclass with Sri Lankan spin legend Muttiah Muralitharan

If England's two-Test tour of Sri Lanka had gone ahead, Joe Root's men would have been grateful they weren't facing Muttiah Muralitharan!

The Sri Lanka spinner picked up a world-record 800 Test wickets between 1992 and 2010 - 112 of them against England, including a career-best match haul of 16-220 at The Oval in August 1998.

Murali bamboozled countless batsmen during his illustrious Test career, one in which he picked up 67 five-wicket hauls and took 10 wickets or more in a match on 22 occasions.

On England's previous tour of Sri Lanka in 2018, the cricketing great talked through and demonstrated his array of skills in a two-part masterclass.

Watch part one in the video at the top of the page and part two in the video below.

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In part two of our masterclass, Nasser Hussain takes on Murali!

Every Tuesday during cricket's coronavirus-enforced break, skysports.com will show one of our many masterclasses and the effervescent Murali seemed the perfect man to start with!

Before getting into his spin skills, Muralitharan spoke about his work with the Foundation of Goodness in Seenigama, a charity he helped set up in 1999 and that for the past 21 years has helped the people in the village, not least in the aftermath of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami.

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When talk turns to cricket, Muali explains how he started out as a fast bowler before switching to off-spin at the age of 13 when his coach told him he wasn't strong enough to bowl seam.

MUTTIAH MURALITHARAN'S TEST CAREER

  • Wickets: 800
  • Matches: 133
  • Bowling average: 22.72
  • Strike rate: 55
  • Five-wicket hauls: 67
  • 10 wickets in match: 22
  • Best innings figures: 9-51 (vs Zimbabwe, Kandy 2002)
  • Best match figures: 16-220 (vs England, The Oval, 1998)

The Sri Lankan also discusses the numerous times his action was tested by the ICC - and how it was only when he saw himself bowling on TV that he realised his action was different to any other bowler.

Murali explains the subtle ways in which he tried to deceive batsmen, how long it took him to develop his doosra, and runs through his range of deliveries - showing that his incredible accuracy remains even in his forties!

Our very own Nasser Hussain also explains what it was like to face Murali in his pomp before strapping on his pads and facing the man himself...

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