Ashes 2017/18: Darren Lehmann All Praises About Pat Cummins Ability With the Bat

Australia regained the Ashes Urn after the winning the series 4-0 and the secret behind their success has been the Australian pace battery. One of the biggest transitions for the home team has been the emergence of their third pacer Pat Cummins. Cummins had to wait for six years to make his home Test debut since his Test debut against South Africa in 2011, but he grabbed this opportunity with both the hands and finished the series as the highest wicket-taker.

The 24-year-old Aussie pacer has done an exceptional job for his team in the five Tests picking up 23 wickets. However, another advantage of having Cummins in their side has been his batting as he has averaged 41.5 in the series. Cummins also bowled the most number of overs by any of the Aussie quicks, but head coach Darren Lehmann has been all praises of his ability with the bat.

Lehmann said:

“Certainly with the bat, we challenged Pat at the start of the summer to make more runs, and he’s done that five-fold and exceeded our expectations. With the ball, we know he’s always had the potential and he can certainly run through a batting line-up.” 

All the four Australian bowlers finished with more than 20 wickets in the series, just the third time this has happened in the history of Test cricket. Lehmann has not backed out on comparing this bowling combination with their predecessors. He said:

“They certainly have the potential to be, (Ryan) Harris, (Peter) Siddle, (Mitchell) Johnson and Lyon were pretty good four years ago, but these guys are younger – they’ve got the appetite to be great. And the way they’ve done it; the last two wickets were a little bit slow and low … the first three had some pace and bounce in them, but they adapted to those conditions really well.”

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