MS Dhoni praises Jasprit Bumrah, admits India have a settled bowling unit
After India sealed a 3-0 whitewash and jumped to No.1 in the ICC T20I rankings, captain MS Dhoni had plenty of positives from the tour to Australia. Dhoni picked out and praised the impressive Jasprit Bumrah, who is now part of a settled bowling unit.
“The find [of the tour] for me was Bumrah,” Dhoni said in the post-match press conference. "The way he has bowled in the last three games was really good. What looks good is Bumrah as a potential player.
“He’s looking really good, and even today he bowled the yorkers well. And I've always said that to be successful in the shorter format you have to execute the yorkers. Whether you choose to bowl it or not is up to you, but if you don't have that option, then definitely at some point of time, you will be under pressure.”
Whether it was simply tempting fate or an honest assessment of India's bowling in theT20I series, Dhoni’s statements that the bowling looks settles is something every Indian fan would be thrilled to hear.
"I am always worried about the bowling, especially when we go out of India, but now that we are playing only T20s for a consistent period of time, the bowling is looking settled," Dhoni said. "I don't have to worry about the bowling line-up. There might be one or two changes here or there: we might pick another spinner or maybe get a medium-fast bowler of a quick, but overall it has been a good set-up.”
Need to give chances to those performing well in the domestic circuit: Dhoni
The Indian limited-overs skipper also admitted that one of the reasons why there was a lot of change from their last T20I series was because their old methods simply weren’t working and it was time to try new things.
"We wanted to try different people because we have been trying the same few individuals and getting the same result," the 34-year-old said. "So it was high time we gave chances to individuals who were doing well in the domestic circuit, and to see what really they have to offer.
"And at the same time, once they play over here and go back, they at least know what are the departments they need to work on. Because there's a lot of difference between our first-class cricket and international cricket. The gap is quite wide between them.
“So now at least with a few games here, a bit of practice with the Indian team and the bowling coaches, at least once they go back, they know what needs to be done. I think a lot of them will have to field really hard, they'll have to push themselves to improve their fielding. And as far as just the talent is concerned, there were quite a few people who looked good.”
Dhoni glowing in his tribute of India’s top-order
The form of Virat Kohli (who was the Man of the Series with three consecutive fifties) and the two openers drew special praise from Dhoni, who paid tribute to their consistency.
"I feel that it is difficult to follow up a big performance, like a score of 100 or 80, with another big performance," Dhoni said. "What has been good in this series is how the top order has consistently performed. It is very difficult.
"When you are scoring lots of runs you get a lot of confidence, but at the same time, there comes a time when you put that extra pressure on yourself too. You may think that the law of averages will strike at some point. But they have carried it through the whole series, they always gave us a very good start. And it was always the top order.
"If you talk about five, six, seven and the lower-down batsmen, apart from that one game [Canberra ODI], we were just doing the sweeping job of playing 10-12 deliveries, or 15 deliveries maximum. The top order did really well in this tournament for us.”