Akash Deep: A Mohammed Rafi fan who once called cricket ‘ameeron ka khel,’ never trusted his ‘hunar’ and is now India’s hero

Akash Deep lost his father and elder brother in six months when he was 18. During the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic, after struggling to procure an oxygen cylinder for his mother, she survived. Earlier this year, while undergoing rehab at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru, he was busy Googling the best doctor for liver cancer in India to treat his elder sister. Fast forward to the last week at Edgbaston, he produced two great spells to dismantle England’s top order and led India to a win, and to add to that, earned himself a song from the Brummies.