Bhuvneshwar Kumar attributed his return to the Indian team as a key pacer to the skills he perfected while bowling the death overs for Sunrisers in the Indian Premier League.
Bhuvneshwar emerged the highest wicket-taker in the IPL 2016, finishing with 23 wickets.
“When playing for Sunrisers, I had to bowl a lot at the death and I am bringing that mindset into international cricket,” Bhuvneshwar said.
Reflecting on his comeback, Bhuvneshwar said: “there is a bit of nervousness when you are playing after a long time. There is no match practice. “So, it takes the first two-three overs to get over the nervousness,” Bhuvneshwar said.
The pacer said the challenge for a bowler is to stay motivated and deliver when it is quite normal for a team to score around 350 in the ODIs.
“We are getting used to this as 350 is a par score nowadays. We plan our practice and team meetings keeping that in mind. We have come from an era where 250-300 was the par score and now even 350 is not safe,” he said.
“It is not easy bowling yorkers with a wet ball. But those are the things we focus during practice,” Bhuvneshwar added.
The England opener said that his team will now try to avoid a 3-0 rout by winning the last match of the series here. “Of course you want to finish the series on a high but every game from now on till the Champions Trophy is going to be stepping blocks for us,” Roy said looking at the next big international engagement, which will be held in England in June.
‘Lot of positives’
Meanwhile, England opener Jason Roy said his team did well enough in the first two ODIs, but lost to some outstanding individual performances.
“We have got a lot of positives to take from the first two games. We have scored 350 in the first game and 366 in the second and there are enough positives in those efforts,” he said.