Speaking about his six pairs of cricket shoes makes Sakib Hussain feel a little ashamed.
The six pairs of Adidas Adipowers he wore in games this season were purchased by his teammate from Sunrisers Hyderabad, India wicketkeeper-batter Ishan Kishan, who is also from Bihar like Hussain."I didn't have any shoes once," Sakib recalls. "Owning a pair of shoes so pricey is beyond my comprehension. How am I going to wear shoes that cost between Rs 12,000 and Rs 15,000 [about $125 to $155]?"
Sakib, who started focusing on cricket seriously in his late teens, used to play on the tennis-ball circuit in and around his native town, Gopalganj. Though wiry and agile enough to make the ball talk, he was slender and had loose limbs.His goal at the time was to enlist in the Indian army. He would get up early to train and run on a nearby pitch with his elder brother Akib. Sakib has the ability to make the tennis ball talk. "We would get about Rs 300 [$3] per match, and if we travelled 500km or more, we would get 1000-1200 [$10.5]."
When Sakib was around sixteen, his farmer father, Ali Ahmed, had knee issues that prevented him from doing much heavy labour. Sakib and his brother played tennis-ball cricket on the side while taking care of the farm.
He also had to deal with the problem of shoes at that time. "The shoes bought off the roadside for Rs 200-300 wore out soon," Sakib said."The sole would tear. Without spikes, my foot kept slipping and my ankles got sprained many times."One day, he told his mother, "Mummy, joota chahiye." "Bina joote ke, bowling nahin ho payega hum se."
After assuring Sakib not to worry, she started selling jewellery that her parents had given her when she was married. She offered him cash so he could get new shoes. "That is how my journey started," he declares.Sakib claims he never dreamed of being a professional cricket player. However, when he heard many around him argue that he was correct to have none, his ego was aroused. "Tumhari tarah lakhon player hain, tum kuch bhi kar lo tum nahin kehl paayega."

Sakib decided to use actions to refute the doubters. "I told myself that I would accomplish it via my job instead of responding to them verbally. I promised myself, "I'll do it myself."
He was fortunate that the district cricket association in the area recognised his skill and supported him. Another source of encouragement was his coach, Robin Singh, a former player from Bihar. Sakib was comparatively free to concentrate on his training and development because he knew that his requirements would be met.
His strong results in age-group competitions and the Bihar Cricket League helped him get to the IPL. He was selected by the Kolkata Knight Riders for the 2024 Indian Premier League, however he never played and was eventually cut.

Sakib talks about his first one-on-one meeting with Sunrisers bowling coach Varun Aaron, another important figure in his cricket career, early this year at the PJ Hindu Gymkhana in Mumbai.
He wanted to make an impression by letting the ball fly off a hard length, just like any young tearaway fast bowler. He now claims that the difference between how he bowled that day and where he is now is unbelievable. "I just sprayed the ball in four different directions, so to speak." I was upset, but Varun bhaiyya, who is more like an elder brother to me than a coach, reassured me that everything would be alright.

"I trusted him and he trusted me because he told me to just concentrate on what he was saying. I will never forget that first day because of the comparison to where I am now. "Woh pehla din yaad rakhna," he says to me.
The day before Sakib's IPL debut against the Rajasthan Royals in April, Aaron approached him, wrapped his arm around him, and begged him to play freely. "He said, 'Look, do what you have been doing, don't try anything [extra],'" Sakib responds. "Avoid being tense. It is acceptable for both positive and negative events to occur. I felt really confident knowing that I had someone to take care of me.That has contributed to my advancement.
Sakib and Hinge easily defeated RR by sticking to their strategies and taking four wickets each. Donovan Ferreira, a hitter from South Africa, was bowled with a cutter after failing to read the bowler's hand and strategy, which may have been Sakib's best wicket. One of Sakib's greatest assets has been his ability to change speeds; he can deliver a ball at 140 kph and then decrease to 105 the next.
Sakib defeated Shivam Dube of the Chennai Super Kings in both his second and second games.Sakib's four overs, which lasted for 32 runs, yielded only one wicket, but it was a crucial breakthrough because Dube had been crucial to CSK's chances. Sakib conceded just 19 runs in his remaining three overs during the powerplay, despite giving up 13 in his opening over.
When Sakib bowled the last over of the first innings in Chennai a month later, he tried Dube once again with cutters and sharp lines before surprising him with a delivery that pitched on leg, stayed low, and beat the bat swing to hit middle stump.

"I felt he was finding it a bit difficult, not understanding my variations clearly," Sakib said.My deliveries seemed to annoy him. He probably assumed that because I was bowling quickly, I might bowl a bouncer, but I bowled the yorker in front of him [in Hyderabad] and got him bowled."
In the league stage of the competition, Sakib made 228 deliveries, of which 104 were slower. Amazingly, he didn't learn how to bowl the variation until he returned home after the 2024 IPL.In 2024, I bowled a slower ball that was halka-phulka, or half-baked. However, I spoke with Sachin Kumar, a friend from my tennis and cricket days, when I got home."

"We need you to develop the slower ball," he stated. He advised me to learn how to bowl slower balls, such as the dipping ones that DJ Bravo used to deliver. I learned how to play the ball from Sachin, and we worked on it for ten or twelve days before I kept improving."
Sakib began by using the tennis ball to practise the slower delivery before switching to the cricket ball. He quickly began to feel the proper grip, and he gained the self-assurance to attempt the slower ball during games. The bowler's accuracy in landing the ball where he wants it to have a significant influence. Sakib gives Aaron credit for that.

"My friend [Kumar] taught me, but the fact about which length to bowl and when and such stuff was taught by Varun bhaiyya."
Sakib smiles when you ask him about his favourite IPL wicket he has taken with the slower ball.It happened last weekend on a slow ground in Hyderabad during SRH's final league game against reigning champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru. [Virat] Kohli bhaiyya ka.
Sakib got a sense of the type of pitch when he sat next to Aaron and watched the RCB bowlers in the first inning while the Sunrisers' hitters amassed 255. "We observed that the ball was clutching. When Rasikh Salam bowled on the powerplay, I saw it. Together with our video analyser and Varun bhaiyya, I planned it."

A key component of that specific strategy was Sunrisers captain Pat Cummins. "He reads things well on the ground, compared to me," Sakib said. "He typically plans what to bowl on which wicket. He instructed me to go completely slow after he had already bowled two overs [during the powerplay]. I simply followed his instructions. However, I will never forget the Kohli wicket.
There have also been some challenging lessons learned, such as when he had his most costly spell of the season—1 for 62 in four overs—in the second match against the Royals in Jaipur late in April."You learn from experiences," he asserts. "Tum ko kuch boley hum?" asked Varun bhaiyya. Oh, boley, nahi bhaiyya. Hum bolenge toh kuch farak padega, woh boley. "Aaram se bindaas raho." [Aaron said, did I mention being pricey to you? No, I replied. "It will mean something if I say it," he said. Don't worry.
After missing the first seven games due to a lower-back injury while awaiting Cricket Australia's health clearance, Cummins led SRH in that game for the first time this season. Sakib was asked to be forthright and not bashful by Cummins, one of the best captains in the game and a good communicator.

Sakib claims to view a particular video clip each night before turning off. When he was selected by KKR in the 2024 IPL auction, his parents were interviewed by a local news program in Bihar. It shows his father sitting on a wooden cot and crying joyfully. Sakib's mother, Subuktara Khatoon, expresses her pride that Sakib's early diligence has paid off. "Woh cheez hum ko yaad dila ta hain ki tum kahan se aaye ho." [That reminds me of my origins.]
Abdul Ghafoor and Lalu Prasad Yadav, two former chief ministers of Bihar, are from Gopalganj. Bollywood actor Pankaj Tripathi agrees.Mukesh Kumar, a fast bowler for Bengal and India, is also from there. When I tell Sakib that his name will now be added to the list of well-known Gopalganj residents, he smiles shyly once again.
He currently has no material objectives other than ensuring his parents are safe and content. "Whatever I will earn is for my parents, who struggled for me," he states. "Personally, I just have to play cricket." "Having self-respect was the one thing I wanted when I came to the IPL." That is a crucial issue. Second, I want to contribute to the team's IPL victory."