Amidst stars, steely resolve and skill do it for Bhuvi

LEEDS: Bhuvneshwar Kumar will carry home many accolades showered by former players on this England tour. However, skipper MS Dhoni dubbing Tuesday’s performance ‘fantastic’ is likely to be the most cherished, for it makes him one of the crucial members of a team that will, six months on, defend the World Cup.

After a sedate showing in the first two ODIs, Bhuvneshwar was back in the thick of things at Edgbaston. He prised out two early wickets in one over, and beat Alex Hales with swing and bowled him to give a hint of the damage he can cause when on song.

Bhuvneshwar, 24, is one of those who have worked his way up. Hailing from Meerut and growing up some distance away from a proper cricket ground, he had to take a combination of public transport to reach training. Thus, he knows the value of persistence. His childhood coach in Meerut gushes about the work he has put in. TOO FRAIL “He wasn’t strongly built. So there was no way he was going to be express fast. In fact, in the early part of his career, he has fallen ill more due to fatigue. But he recovered and came back with a bang in junior cricket. That is his ability,” Sanjay Rastogi told HT recently.

In fact, before the England tour, he put in extra work on his batting too, and that effort bore fruit as his three half-centuries in a row in the first two Tests proved vital in India going 1-0 up in the series. His good habits have shone through. There is no fanfare or the fan following that accompanies some others. He has stayed grounded, obliging whoever approaches him. GAME TRIER In the Tests, he soldiered on and Dhoni admitted after Edgbaston win that he had to over-bowl him as Ishant Sharma was injured.

Dhoni said: “He is fantastic because he can swing the ball both ways. And he was bowling in the right areas.”

Bhuvi bowled 42 dot deliveries, 19 of them to Joe Root and 13 to Alastair Cook. That many dot deliveries translate to seven maiden overs!

It was nothing new. In the Tests, even when he got tired, the line was unwavering — Dhoni once bowled him for almost half the 36 overs India had sent down by then. With his ability to keep batsmen guessing, India will hope his cricket continues to do all the talking.