Sunil Gavaskar Bats For Kuldeep Yadav's Inclusion In Playing Eleven For Australia Tests

Lavishing praise on Kuldeep Yadav for his show in the first Test against West Indies, former India skipper Sunil Gavaskar feels the chinaman spinner should be included in the playing eleven during the upcoming Tests in England.

Kuldeep Yadav spun a web around the West Indies players in the second innings. He picked up five for 57 as India bowled out the visitors for 196 to win the game by an innings and 272 runs. It was a remarkable comeback from Kuldeep who had a tough outing in the first innings. The chinaman spinner picked up just a solitary wicket while conceding 62 runs in 10 overs.

Impressed with his performance, Sunil Gavaskar heaped praise on Kuldeep.

“The way Kuldeep recovered after the first innings, the way he adjusted his length, the way he went round the wicket, shows that he is a thinking bowler. About the fact that he has got guts, he has got a big heart to take punishment, there has never been a second opinion about that.

“He has always been a gutsy bowler because wrist spinners, will always bowl the odd full-toss, the odd short-pitched delivery and they will get punished but to come back after that and to keep persisting is what makes him a bit different than a lot of other bowlers,” Gavaskar told India Today.

Unlike the first innings, Kuldeep did not give much flight to his deliveries in the second innings. It helped him to put a stop to the scoring-rate which finally allowed him to take wickets.

Gavaskar further stressed on the fact that Kuldeep can be potent weapon for India on Australian pitches.

“On the Australian pitches, where the bowl bounces a lot more and there is turn for the wrist spinners as we have seen with Shane Warne, the Indian selection committee will think very seriously. If not for the first Test because the square boundaries at Adelaide are little bit short and he might get a little punished over there but other grounds, where the square boundaries aren’t that short, he certainly has to come in the frame for a place in the XI,” Gavaskar said about Kuldeep being one of the spinners in the playing XI against the Aussies.

Meanwhile, Kuldeep joined a select list of bowlers to register a five-wicket haul in all three formats of the game. Kuldeep became the seventh bowler to achieve the feat and the second Indian bowler after Bhuvneshwar Kumar to join the list.

Tim Southee (New Zealand), Ajantha Mendis (Sri Lanka), Umar Gul (Pakistan), Lasith Malinga (Sri Lanka) and Imran Tahir (South Africa) are the other bowlers to take a five-for in all three formats. Kuldeep had taken five-wicket hauls in One-Day Internationals (ODI) and Twenty20 Internationals (T20Is) earlier this year against England.

He also became only the second chinaman spinner to take a five-wicket haul in Tests.