Bhuvneshwar Kumar reckons India is ready of England, Australia challenge

The Indian team culminated their South Africa tour on a high after their win last night at Cape Town, and in the process registered a double series win. After starting the tour with a narrow 1-2 loss in the Tests, India ended the bilateral series notching up a thrilling seven-run win in the third T20 International on Saturday for a 2-1 result. The visitors had previously recorded a dominating 5-1 win series win in the one-dayers.

With such exemplary display of cricket, the Men in Blue have climbed to the epitome of the ICC rankings, topping both the ODI and Test charts. And ahead of the tougher assignments against England and Australia later this year, pace spearhead Bhuvneshwar Kumar feels Indian team’s recent heroics augers well.

According to TOI, Kumar, who was awarded the Man of the Series said, “We don’t want to be too greedy and we are happy with these two trophies. Hopefully next time we will win all the three trophies.”

He added, “This tour has been brilliant, particularly talking about Test series. Yes, we lost two matches, but they were very close. We could have also lost 3-0 or won 2-1 instead. But it gives us confidence in whatever way we have played, and we are ready to go to England and Australia, and do better there.”

Variations and timing were key to Bhuvaneshwar’s success in the T20 series

The 28-year old’s performance was one of the highlights of this tour. The medium-pacer was clinical every time he was handed the ball. Heralded for his inch-perfect knuckleball, Kumar did well to well to rotate his variations and surprise the batsman. He opined one has to be proactive in the shorter formats of the game.

In fact last night too, India had Bhuvneshwar Kumar to thank as he kept his nerve, giving away only 11 off the last over when South Africa needed 19 runs to win. Earlier, during powerplay overs, Kumar bowled a tight first spell to leave South Africa at 25/1 in six overs.