Kyle Jamieson has played down reports that Virat Kohli asked him to bowl to him with the Dukes ball when the pair were playing for Royal Challengers Bangalore during the IPL.
The story emerged in the lead up to the World Test Championship, in which Jamieson was named Player of the Match and twice claimed Kohli’s wicket.
Dan Christian, who was also part of the RCB squad, recounted the anecdote while speaking on The Grade Cricketer’s YouTube channel, suggesting that Kohli had been eager to see how Jamieson made use of the Dukes ball, which was used in the final.
"Pretty cagey from Virat actually, right in the first week we were here. The three of us were sitting down after the nets and these two were talking about Test cricket,” Christian told The Grade Cricketer.
"Virat said: 'So Jamie have you bowled much with the Dukes ball?' and they are talking about that stuff.
"Jamie says: 'Yeah, I have a couple of them here, I will have a bowl leading in before I go over there' and Virat says 'Oh, if you want to have a bowl against me in the nets, I am more than happy to face'.
"Jamie was like, 'No chance I am going to ball at you!' He would have looked at his release point and everything that he does with the Dukes ball! "
But Jamieson, speaking from England where he is now playing for Surrey in the T20 Blast, suggested the story had been embellished.
“No, it wasn’t so much him asking,” said Jamieson. “I think it was Dan just sort of adding some stuff for a good story. We were just talking about it at the start of the IPL with the cricket coming up with our UK tour and theirs as well and I mentioned that I had some Dukes balls, he had some Dukes balls as well.
“He just said look at the back end if we want to do some training, we'll do that but there was no specificity around me bowing to him or, or giving him a look, but whether he was insinuating something that’s something he could tell you but obviously quite a funny story that’s unfolded.”
Jamieson had claimed Kohli’s wicket with the Kookaburra ball during India’s Tour of New Zealand in 2020. It was Jamieson’s maiden Test series and on the back of his impressive performances he was picked up by RCB for approximate AUD $2.6 million.
The New Zealander said that, while he didn’t necessarily pick up specific clues on how to trouble Kohli, the experience of being in the RCB had been helpful.
“Yeah, it was good, obviously, just being in the change room with him for six or so weeks was pretty cool,” Jamieson said. “He's a world class player and just to spend time observing how he operates and how he goes about things both on and off the field was pretty cool and you know it's nice just to be able to be friendly out in the middle even just having a bit of a laugh and a joke, while the game was going on.
“There wasn't too much specificity around in there having a game but yeah just nice to obviously have that relationship with someone I guess of his stature in the game.
“I don't know if that helped specifically around different queues and stuff but wasn't something that I necessarily contemplated. I think anytime you get to spend time with different world class guys you sort of grow in confidence, you learn and become a bit more, I guess, comfortable, we come up against different guys so yeah, certainly, I guess from that perspective.”
The past 18 months have seen the tall fast bowler’s reputation skyrocket. In eight Tests he has claimed five five-wicket hauls and taken 46 wickets at an average of 14.17 and a strike rate of 37.40.
Jamieson also gave some insight into the atmosphere in the dressing room as Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor steered New Zealand to an eight-wicket victory and the World Test Championship Trophy.
“I wouldn't say I was a nervous wreck but it was certainly probably the hardest time I've had to watch guys go out to bat because the crowd noise was something else,” Jamieson said. “We were watching on TV and there was a bit of a delay between what was happening out in the middle and what was actually happening on TV.
“It seemed like with the crowd noise that there was a wicket every ball or something like that so it wasn’t great. We were sitting in our chairs and we weren’t moving. But yeah it was all good fun and obviously nice that Kane and Ross out there, they sort of settled it nicely and got the job done.”
