Indian cricket team may have suffered a 1-2 ODI series defeat against Australia but star all-rounder Hardik Pandya won millions of hearts with his outstanding batting performance in the recently-conclude ODI series and the latest one is the legend cricketer Sunil Gavaskar.
Pandya is evolving himself as a great finisher for Team India and he has proved this in the recent ODI series, as the right-hander finished the series on high, scoring 90, 28, and 1 wicket and another brilliant unbeaten knock of 92* off 76 balls including 7 fours and a six in Australia.
The 27-year-old performed with the bat when India needed him the most and even his record 6th wicket partnership with Ravindra Jadeja (66 off 50), adding 150 runs in 18 overs, took India to a par score of 302 – which they successfully defended in Canberra, as the tourists escaped from an embarrassing white-wash in the three-match ODI series by winning final ODI by 13 runs on December 2.
After his Man of the Match show on Wednesday, Gavaskar heaped praise on Pandya saying the all-rounder has shown great maturity in the ODI series against Australia.
Gavaskar said on India Today TV: “Today was very smart, very good cricket from this young man (Pandya) who is showing great maturity with every game that he is playing. Even the first game when he got to 90, the maturity that he showed there and today after Virat Kohli was out he recognized that the fact that he needed to bat until the end if India were to get to a total that they could defend.”
He added, “And the way he and Jadeja planned that innings where they batted sensibly till the 40-42 overs and then they started to accelerate, and that made the difference in the game.”
The former India captain was also mighty impressed with the way both all-rounders Pandya and Jadeja ran between the wickets, describing the duo as “supreme athletes”.
Gavaskar signed off by saying, “But you know what really made the difference as far as I am concerned was their running between the wickets. The sixes, if you time the ball well, you have the power and you can hit them. But they were stealing the second run under the fielder’s noses. The ball was going straight to the fielder at long-off and long-on, and both these guys are supreme athletes.”
