James Lee Pattinson

Glenn McGrath has already asserted that Pattinson has the makings of a great

He’s 21. His last name is Pattinson, and he is a heartbreaker of no mean potency. James Lee Pattinson, who shares his last name with tween Twilight heartthrob Robert Pattinson, has suddenly emerged to crush India’s hopes and hearts with his lethal spells in the ongoing India-Australia Test series Down Under. In the three-and-a-half Tests the right-arm fast bowler has played in his career (at the time of going to press), he has picked up 24 wickets, ten of them against India.

In the first Test of the series at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Pattinson was named ‘Man of the Match’ for picking up six wickets for 108 runs and scoring 55 runs. In the first innings of the second Test at Sydney, he came away pocketing all the big ones in his bag: Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, VVS Laxman and Gautam Gambhir, who fell in the first over of the match bowled by Pattinson.

In his debut Test against New Zealand in the beginning of December 2011, Pattinson picked up five wickets in the second innings. He followed up with another five-wicket haul in the second Test, and was adjudged the ‘Man of the Series’ for his spoils.

Pattinson is highly rated as a strike bowler by his captain Michael Clarke, who has him bowl first-up ahead of other Aussie quickies such as Peter Siddle and Ben Hilfenhaus. He was named in the Australian Test squad for Sri Lanka in August 2011 when he had played just six first class games. Australia’s former opening bowler and one of the world’s best fast bowlers, Glenn McGrath, has already asserted that Pattinson has the makings of a great.

His next-big-thing rating notwithstanding, he didn’t make much of an impression on his bosses at the Kolkata Knight Riders, who barely played him in IPL 2011. He was picked up for his base price of $100,000.

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arindam