Border Gavaskar Trophy: ‘Short of a gallop’: Michael Vaughan believes Australian skipper Pat Cummins needs to add more pace | Cricket News

With Australian skipper Pat Cummins managing to take only three wickets for 153 runs in his 40 overs during Australia’s 295-run loss to India in the opening Test match of the Border Gavaskar Trophy at Perth, the talk has been about the 31-year-old regrouping the Australian attack ahead of the second Pink Ball Test match at Adelaide starting December 6. Former England cricketer Michael Vaughan believes that the Australian pace spearhead looked short of a gallop in the opening Test and needs to add more pace.
“He’s a world-class performer, a brilliant captain and a brilliant bowler. (But) the one thing I’ll say is he did look short of a gallop in the First Test. He’d not been playing any cricket. He had not played any longer format cricket since March. So I would think this week in Adelaide, he will be up on his pace because of what he did last week. I think the First Test will be good for him. He’s got some overs back into his body, into his mind, playing the longer format back into his system, and I think he’ll be better for it.” Vaughan told The Follow On.
As per Codesports and data Cricviz, Cummins’s speed has dipped from an average speed of 140.6km/hr in 2018 to 136km/hr over the past one year. The 31-year-old has a total of 272 wickets in 63 Test matches. Earlier this year, Cummins had a forgetful series in the West Indies where he picked five wickets in Two test matches at an average of 36.20. According to Codesports, his bowling average has increased from 22.15 two years ago to 22.85 at present. Vaughan was of the view that pace counts a lot for Cummins. “Pace is a lot for Pat Cummins. If he is down to 135 (or so), I think he it gives the batters that extra little bit of time to adjust to the movement and the accuracy that he produces. We saw it in the Ashes, actually, a couple of years ago, that when England got after him, and when England got after Australia, England looked like a team that were dominating. The field was spread and run scoring became that much easier,” said Vaughan.
With Australia starting the second Pink Ball Test trailing 0-1 in the series, Vaughan sees this week as a big one for the Australian cricket team. “It feels like a big week for Australia. They are one-nil down. And the last time India were there, they bowled them out for 36 and blew them away, but they lost that series. And if you actually look at this Australian Test match team, they haven’t actually won any big series. They’ve got the Ashes. They managed to draw two-all, but anyone who was a real cricket student (would know that) if it was a boxing contest, England had Australia on the ropes,” Vaughan said.