Indian bowlers to watch out for

England and India will be up against each other in the only T20 of the tour on the 31^st of August, 2011 at Manchester.

The home team thrashed the visitors in the most emphatic manner in the Test series and white washed the Men in Blue. The momentum is surely with England and they would love to build on that momentum.

On the other side of the coin, India is a much better team in limited overs cricket and Mahendra Singh Dhoniand his men would be raring to make amends in the only T20 and the five One Day Internationals.

Indian bowlers have been heavily criticized in the tour of England and there is not a shadow of doubt about the fact that bowling the weak link of the men in blue. The English batsmen scored their runs at will in the longer format of the game. India faced another blow after the ouster of Zaheer Khan and Harbhajan Singhfrom the limited overs series as their fast bowler, Ishant Sharma is also not going to be available for the T20 and the ODI series.

Let us have a closer look on some of the Indian bowlers, who can make an impact in the T20 fixture.

Ravichandran Ashwin

The young off-spinner has surely emerged as one of the most dangerous Indian bowlers in limited overs cricket since the last one year. Ashwin has so far been playing only limited overs cricket and he has been doing a commendable job with the presence of Harbhajan Singh. However, he has been rated a second fiddle spinner but this series is an opportunity for him to prove that he is good enough to become the top Indian spinner.

Harbhajan was completely ineffective in the two Test matches that he played in the current series and the cricket analysts believe that the wily off-spinner has gone past his best days in International cricket.

Ashwin has a lot of variety under his belt and has the ability to bamboozle any batsman with his mystery balls. The Indian fans will be hoping that the young spinner can strengthen the Indian bowling attack.

Praveen Kumar

Before India’s tour of the Caribbean earlier this year, Praveen was generally regarded as a limited overs specialist. However, he was given an opportunity to showcase his skills during the Test series against West Indies and England, and the right arm medium pacer grabbed the opportunity with both hands. He was without doubt India’s best bowler during the recently concluded Test series and showed what a wonderful swing bowler he is.

Praveen is not quick by any means and bowls at around 120 kilometres per hour, which is not express at all by international standards. However, his emaculate control and the ability to swing the ball both ways gives him an edge over the other Indian medium pacers. He is surely going to be a triumph card for Dhoni in the T20 fixture and the Indian captain would be expecting good four overs from his premier bowler.

There are some other bowlers like Munaf Patel, Varun Aaron and Amit Mishra, who can make an impact against the strong English batting line-up. However, just like the Test series, bowling is going to remain India’s weak point and there fortunes in the limited overs series depend a lot on how they bowl.