Indian, S African greats give tips to young cricketers in Indore

India and South Africa teams gave some bowling and batting tips to local budding cricketers at Indore’s Holkar Satidium during a practice session on the eve of the one-dayer, Maharaja Yeshwantrao Cricket Club and Cricket Club of India (CCI) members said on Tuesday.

Suyash Jain, 20, of the CCI said playing with international greats was like a dream come true. So far, the locals saw the Dhoni and his brigade and Protease on television.

“But, today we bowled them during a practice session to our satisfaction,” medium pacer Jain, 20, said.

He is a second year engineering student and described his bowling to Jean-Paul Duminy, Dale Steyn and Protease as a precious and memorable experience for him and other local cricketers.

He, like others, was a bit nervous in the beginning. “But, once I started bowling to Duminy, everything was fine. Imran Tahir, the new spin sensation, shared some important bowling tips with me which will be a great help in future,” he said.

Under-21 cricketer Shashank Jain bowled spins to Team India opening batsman Shikhar Dhawan in the morning session. “First, I bowled him spins. But, after some time he preferred to face a medium pacer. A few of my friends then bowled him cutters, outswingers and bouncers and he played them off with an expert’s ease.”

Shashank, who later bowled Amit Mishra in the nets and then clicked a selfie with Rohit (Sharma). He said Team India opening batsman advised him to work harder to excel as a cricketer than taking selfies.

“It is like a guru mantra for many of us and we will stick to it,” he said.