IPL 2022: I think it hurt him slightly – Aakash Chopra on Pat Cummins not getting chances

Former Indian opener Aakash Chopra reckons Pat Cummins had a point to prove against Mumbai Indians after the gun fast bowler was dropped from the playing XI by the Kolkata Knight Riders’ think tank.

Cummins returned with impressive figures of 3-22 in his quota of four overs against Mumbai Indians at the Dr. DY Patil Sports Academy, Mumbai on Monday.

Thus, he played a key role in skittling out the opposition at 113 and helped his team win by a mammoth margin of 52 runs. Meanwhile, Cummins was dropped from the final XI as he was a bit expensive in his spells. However, the Australian Test captain was able to prove his mettle against the five-time champions.

Cummins accounted for a well-settled Ishan Kishan, Daniel Sams, and Murugan Ashwin as he bowled accurately and made great use of the hard length.

Aakash Chopra said on his YouTube Channel, “I am Australia’s captain and I remain the No. 1 Test bowler continuously and you don’t even feel me worthy enough of playing in your XI although your team has lost four five consecutive matches. I think it hurt him slightly.”

“Pat was sitting out for a long time. It seemed he was angry, was playing with a feeling of rancor. And here he got an opportunity again, he didn’t play at the start because he came from Pakistan and was not available due to the quarantine rules.”

In fact, in the previous match against Mumbai Indians, Pat Cummins had won the game with the bat as he had smacked a fifty off just 14 balls to stun the Rohit Sharma-led team.

“But then when he played, he played well, won the match against Mumbai by scoring 50 runs off 14 balls and after that, he was dropped. He was hit in two matches and he was dropped. After that, he was not played.”

Cummins got all of his three wickets by bowling bumpers against Mumbai Indians. The ace paceman was right on the money and the former KKR player added that it is threatening when Cummins picks his wickets via bouncers.

“He (Cummins) took three wickets. They were very important wickets, he dismissed Ishan Kishan – the only batter to score a half-century, Murugan Ashwin and Daniel Sams, by bowling the bouncers, by scaring and threatening the batters, we saw Jasprit Bumrah doing that in the first innings and Pat Cummins in the second.”

KKR will next face SRH at the MCA, Pune on Saturday.