There are ways of getting out, and there are ways of getting out. You can be out feeling uncertainly at a good-length ball in the corridor, and it's just another dismissal. But the world gets a little more judgmental if you're out fending awkwardly at a short ball.
And Shreyas Iyer knows all about it. Whispers - and chatter, and angry yells - about his short-ball game have followed him right through his career. No matter how many runs he may have scored, they never really go away. And they're back now.
In isolation, Iyer's dismissal to Kyle Jamieson in the second ODI of India's rain-hit tour of New Zealand was one of those times when a batter looks ugly without having done anything wrong. It was a brute of a ball on a brute of a pitch. It was short, and it stopped and popped like a tennis ball, jagging into Iyer's throat like a fast offbreak. No batter could have played that ball with any degree of control. At best, Iyer could have hoped the ball would pop off his edge or gloves into a vacant area of the field. It ended up ballooning straight to the wicketkeeper.
In isolation, it was just one dismissal to a really, really nasty delivery. But Iyer's issues on this tour have extended beyond that one ball. New Zealand peppered him both in Auckland and in Wellington, and frequently had him in trouble - in the first ODI, ten of his 15 runs came from boundaries behind the wicket off mis-controlled shots off short balls.
In all, Iyer has faced 24 short or short-of-good-length balls from New Zealand's fast bowlers during this series, and played ten false shots off them, as per Cricinfo's data. Among India's top six, his control percentage against those lengths (58.33) is the same as Rohit Sharma's (who has only faced half the number of short or shortish balls) and only better than that of Axar Patel (36.36, with seven false shots and two dismissals against just 11 balls).
Axar has endured a torrid time against the short ball in this series too, struggling to keep rising balls in the corridor down, and has twice been out in this manner, caught at point and deep backward-point.
Despite the conditions, though, some of India's batters have done exceedingly well against the short ball. Virat Kohli has gone after everything and struck at 140-plus against these lengths while managing a control percentage of 69.23. Shubman Gill (86.49) and KL Rahul (92.31), meanwhile, have achieved outstanding control numbers that will hugely encourage India with both now released from the ODI squad to prepare for the Test series that begins on November 19.
Now these numbers are products of small sample sizes and difficult conditions, so we mustn't read too much into them. And Iyer's numbers over the longer period of the current World Cup cycle aren't bad at all. Of the six India batters who have faced at least 100 short or short-of-good-length balls from fast bowlers in ODIs since the end of the 2023 World Cup, it is Rohit (74.78) and Axar (73.39) who have the lowest control percentages.
"I wouldn't say it's just Shreyas. I think there's a few other people who have got out to short balls, so it's the nature of the wickets, the nature of trying to get people out, it's making sure that we're just trying everything to make sure we can get wickets" Luke Ronchi
And if the quicks may hesitate to bowl short to Rohit, given his strike rate of 124.33 against those lengths, they will have no qualms about targeting Axar, since he has only struck at 71.55.
Iyer's struggles in the ongoing series, then, may be specific to the conditions and the bowling he's had to face, with Jamieson, Jacob Duffy and Blair Tickner all adept at pounding the pitch from a great height and extracting maximum possible misbehaviour. Having sensed some vulnerability, though, New Zealand will no doubt continue peppering him in the last two ODIs in Mount Maunganui.
"Yeah, I think every opposition team does that to everyone," New Zealand batting coach Luke Ronchi said on the eve of the washed-out third ODI in Hamilton. "I think that's the art of cricket as well. Batters and bowlers have all got their own skillsets, and every single player has a weakness. There's no one that doesn't have something that they're not trying to get better at or work on. So that's the art of scouting teams before they arrive, even as a series goes on.
"You work out different bits and pieces and at the moment, with the way the surfaces are playing, they haven't been easy for anyone on the short ball so I wouldn't say it's just Shreyas. I think there's a few other people who have got out to short balls, so it's the nature of the wickets, the nature of trying to get people out, it's making sure that we're just trying everything to make sure we can get wickets. That's the way it works, really."
With Gill having left the ODI squad, there will also be extra scrutiny on Iyer in Mount Maunganui, with the captaincy now his.
But broadly speaking, it might be Axar rather than Iyer whose short-ball game India may need to worry about in the run-up to next year's World Cup in southern Africa, where the pitches may have comparable bounce if not the juice of these ones in New Zealand.