How Dilshan Madushanka bowled a WOOOOW over against Australia

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It is so easy to wax lyrical about fast bowling but Dilshan Madushanka's second over against Australia did not need any more than the most utterly basic details.

Injury stalks Sri Lanka's bowlers. He too will learn to look over his shoulder for it (and immediately tweak it to be ruled out for months) but the result of at least a couple of his seniors not being in India meant he was the de facto leader of the attack. Twenty-three years old. Playing just his ninth ODI. And his first World Cup. Only 209 to defend and going up against David Warner and Steven Smith, and getting them both out without giving a single run in the over. That's just…

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By pure chance, the television broadcast switched from Madushanka to recapping a magic moment from Sri Lanka's World Cup history. They went to 2003 when Chaminda Vaas roused himself to be better than Brian Lara and Chris Gayle.

And by the time they came back to live pictures, it was impossible not to see a bit of the great Sri Lankan left-arm quick in the newest kid on their block, who by the way is already worth about US$ 92,000. Madushanka has almost the same run up, but with the gather and release, he's armed himself with a trick that may well be the reason he went for all that money at the Lanka Premier League auction earlier this year.

Where Vaas had the perfect high arm action, Madushanka delivers the ball just off the perpendicular. Maybe 100 degrees instead of 90. It feels like he's structured himself to accentuate the angle across right-handers. And he's done that so he could do them all in.

All left-arm quicks - from Wasim Akram to Shaheen Afridi to Mitchell Starc - thrive on the ability to bring the ball, against the angle, into right-handers. Everybody knows this. Everybody expects it. But it still keeps happening because high pace + late movement = crossed-out eyes emoji.

Batters cannot adjust when there is no time to do so. And in a way, Madushanka's action seems engineered to exploit this advantage.

Just by trying to almost sling the ball across the right-hander with his beyond-the-perpendicular release, he does two pretty cool things. He drags batters across their crease and in front of their stumps and also sort of delays the onset of the inswing. Both of them were necessary ingredients in handing Smith his first ever World Cup duck.

Left-armers are naturally more likely to get right-handers out lbw, even one as good as Smith at avoiding that dismissal, couldn't prevent it. There was astonishment in the commentary box, particularly from a man who is no stranger to the dismissal. "When I had troubles getting out lbw," Shane Watson said on air, "I used to look at Steve Smith and think 'how?!' because he never misses em."

He missed one here because Madushanka's action made him play for the angle and become a sitting duck once the swing kicked in. Though it's a small sample size right now, right-handers form a large majority of his victims - 13 of 17 - and of that 13, three are bowled and four are lbw. There's also one caught by wicketkeeper as well. He has built his game to hunt for these three modes of dismissals. That may also be why even on bad days - such against South Africa and Pakistan - he still came away with two wickets a piece.

Madushanka's captain Kusal Mendis reckons he can bowl in all phases of the game - in other words late swing into the right-hander isn't his only trick. And he did have Glenn Maxwell looking slightly awkward facing his short ball before Australia cantered to their victory in Lucknow.

For a bowler who is still very much figuring himself out, doing what he did to Warner, Smith and Maxwell is W 0 0 0 0 W.