'We are seeing this problem for 12-15 months now' - Aakash Chopra disappointed with Bhuvneshwar Kumar's recent performance

Aakash Chopra had recently opened up on the struggles of Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the last two years in all forms of cricket and opined his views on the seamer. Bhuvneshwar bowled a decent spell in the powerplay despite not picking up a wicket but his overall figures got affected after an assault near the back end of the innings. He finished with 0-64 in his 10 over spell in the first ODI against the Proteas and this is not the first time he has been ineffective with the ball.

His ability to pick up wickets with the new ball has been one of his great strengths over the year but he seems to have not got it right and has been nowhere near his best. His IPL numbers have gone down in the last two years as well and he is no longer the T20 specialist he used to be. He wasn’t retained by the Sunrisers Hyderabad franchise ahead of IPL 2022 and instead, the youngsters were preferred. It will be interesting to see if India sticks with him as India have already gone down 0-1 in the three-match ODI series.

Bhuvneshwar’s lack of sharpness is a persistent problem: Aakash Chopra

Chopra mentioned that Bhuvneshwar had not been able to provide breakthroughs consistently for a while now and was disappointed with his bowling efforts. The 31-year-old has 141 wickets in 120 ODIs and has enough experience to be lagging down in the wickets column. It has to be noted that the right arm seamer was dropped from the playing XI after the first game of the T20 World Cup against Pakistan and the same could happen again.

“Jasprit Bumrah did get Janneman Malan out with the new ball, it was a very good delivery. Bhuvneshwar Kumar – initially alright but after that, the sharpness is not being seen and it is a persistent problem,”

“It is not that we are seeing this problem now, it is now 12 to 15 months. We haven’t seen the best of Bhuvneshwar Kumar thus far and that’s a bit of a disappointment if you talk from my viewpoint. Shardul Thakur tries his best but he also couldn’t do anything here,” Aakash Chopra told on his Youtube Channel

Centuries from Rassie van der Dussen and Temba Bavuma helped the South Africa side recover from early hiccups and secured a victory comfortably by 31 runs in the end.