LUCKNOW: He is so soft-spoken that one can barely hear him when he talks. But give him a cricket ball and you can see him make it talk, loud and clear.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar grabbed the nation's attention when he picked three early wickets on his Team India T20 debut against Pakistan on Tuesday, to give his team a glimmer of hope while defending a meager total. India lost the match but the young Uttar Pradesh allrounder stayed in the minds of fans and critics for the manner in which he rattled the Pakistani batsmen with his accurate swing bowling.
The lanky 22-year-old paceman was earlier known for being the first bowler in domestic cricket to dismiss Sachin Tendulkar for a duck. That was Bhuvneshwar's 11th first-class match, the 2008-09 Ranji final against Mumbai. UP lost that match but the performance of Bhuvi, as he is fondly called, was one of the biggest gains for UP.
The Gurjar boy's family has roots in Luharli village in Bulandshahr. He was born on December 5, 1990 in Kanpur and learnt his first lessons in cricket at an early age at the Victoria Club in Meerut, run by former UP wicketkeeper Vipin Vats. The bowling skills were imparted by coach Sanjay Rastogi.
"I first saw him as a sprightly young boy trying to bowl fast in our nets. When I watched him closely, I realised he had the talent but needed to be taught the finer points on using the new ball. He honed his skills well and has followed in the footsteps of another Meerut pacer Praveen Kumar who also relishes swing bowling. The advantage with Bhuvi is that he is a better batsman that Praveen. If he keeps improving, he can be an all-rounder in the Manoj Prabhakar mould," Rastogi says about Bhuvi.
Bhuvneshwar's career graph has shown a gradual rise. Till last year he was also playing in the CK Nayudu under-22 tournament for UP, besides representing their Ranji team since 2007. He came into limelight when he picked up 35 wickets in his second season in 2008-09 and has since flourished in the company of Team India bowlers like RP Singh, Praveen and Sudeep Tyagi. To his credit, he has held his own.
With both RP and Praveen out due to injury this season, he has emerged as the spearhead of the UP bowling attack, and that has prompted him to give his best. With 27 wickets in six matches, he is among the top wicket-takers in domestic cricket.
Bhuvneshwar showed his batting prowess when he single-handedly bailed Central Zone out of a hopeless situation in a Duleep Trophy match against North Zone at the start of the season. Coming in at No. 8 with 233 still to get, Bhuvi added 127 runs with Rituraj Singh for the last wicket against an attack which boasted of Ishant Sharma, Parvinder Awana, Amit Mishra and Rahul Sharma. He got his maiden first class century (128) in the process and gained hugely in confidence.
His India 'A' coach Lalchand Rajput, who worked on his batting on the tours of West Indies and New Zealand, had praised his batting effort for Central Zone. Rajput had told TOI in Nagpur then: "It's great to see him play such a knock in such a tight situation.
"It's still early days but he has the potential to become a genuine allrounder. Bhuvi is a very good bowler. He is very hardworking and disciplined and I hope he keeps performing well both with bat and ball."
