Varun Aaron at Keenan Stadium in Jamshedpur on Thursday. (Bhola Prasad)

Jamshedpur, March 3: He makes willow warriors wince in worry. He makes pacers pause in wonder. And speed, they say, is his second name.

Meet Varun Aaron, the arguable Indian cousin of Rawalpindi Express Shoaib Akhtar. The 21-year-old Jamshedpur boy is currently the country’s fastest domestic tie bowler with a delivery speed of 153.5kmph.

Varun crossed the 150kmph speedometer mark in the just concluded Vijay Hazare Trophy final at Holkar Stadium in Indore. Though the Jharkhand spearhead’s delivery did not cause any harm to Gujarat batsmen, his torrential pace did come under the notice of senior national selectors Narendra Hirwani and Surendra Bhave.

Coming out of a nagging back injury, which threatened to derail our very own Rajdhani Express’s career not long ago, Varun surpassed Ishant Sharma’s 149.5kmph delivery record in domestic circuit. The youngster is serious about bowling more such sizzlers in his next assignment — the Deodhar Trophy.

“I feel happy to have regained my pace. I love speed,” Varun told The Telegraph. He added that the record struck him after the match as the effort was not predetermined. “I was bowling at my normal speed of above 144.5 km/hour, but I must have bent my back a tad more to generate that kind of a speed,” the right-hand bowler said.

A potent force in the Jharkhand Ranji pace attack, Varun is indebted to the legendary Dennis Lillee who was instrumental in changing his bowling action.

“Earlier, my body used to bend on the left at the time of releasing the ball. This put more load on me. But now I am bowling straight. The change in posture has helped me generate more speed,” he said, recalling Lillee’s role in his stint at the MRF Pace Academy in Chennai.

The youth firmly believes that speed has to be God-gifted and cannot be gathered through training. “Speed is natural. One cannot train to bowl fast,” he said, adding that he had put in a lot of hard work in maintaining his body all these years.

“I have spent time in increasing my core strength. The hours spent at the gym is paying dividends now. I feel confident and swifter,” the medium pacer, who will don the Delhi Daredevils jersey in next month’s IPL, said.

Varun relies heavily on high-protein diet, with eggs and meat coming up as his major health supplements.

Besides speed, the well-built seamer is also known as a good mover of the ball. Basically an in-swing bowler, Varun also has the capability to surprise batsmen with his away swingers. He is a dangerous opponent with his off-cutters and leg-cutters too.

The city boy had been bowling at 137-138kmph during his stints in junior cricket, but age has added more strength to his overall performance. “Yes, it is a fact and natural at that. I used to make quick deliveries during my formative years, but age has surely added more power. Regular stints at the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore and tutelage under Dennis Sir have helped me a lot. Seam bowling depends a lot on how you maintain your body,” the shooting star signed off.