Former England skipper Michael Vaughan heaped praise on premier Australia pacer Pat Cummins for his consistency in red-ball cricket in the past few years. Cummins led the Aussie side to another memorable triumph on Friday as the hosts beat Pakistan by 79 runs in the Boxing Day Test at Melbourne Cricket Ground. The Aussie captain claimed a 10-wicket haul to dismantle Pakistan’s batting line-up as the hosts claimed an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series.
Vaughan, who is very vocal about his views and opinions, asserted that Cummins will soon achieve the same stature as Glenn McGrath and Denis Lille in Australian cricket.
“In years gone by, he’s certainly going to be talked of in the same breath as McGrath and Lillee. That [bowling] average is low now, but I think it will get better,” Vaughan said on Fox Sports.
During the same discussion, former Australia skipper Mark Waugh also shared his views and said that Cummins was a bit unlucky at the start of his career but when he started raking up big numbers there is no stopping for him after that.
“I reckon early in his career he was luckless. He didn’t get a lot of wickets in the first part of his career. He just bowled a fraction short, but he beat the bat a lot. It took him a while for him to get the big numbers up, but he hasn’t looked back the last couple of years. He’s going to be one of the all-time greats,” Waugh reckoned.
Meanwhile, Cummins was the standout bowler for Australia in both innings with five wickets each. Set 317 for victory, the visitors put up a stellar fight as they chased their first Test triumph in Australia since 1995.
But they were dismissed for 237, with the last five wickets falling for 18 runs. Australian skipper Cummins was the chief destroyer, taking 5-49 to go with his first innings of 5-48 — only the second 10-wicket haul of his Test career.
Mitchell Starc chipped in with 4-55 as the tail collapsed after Shan Masood (60), Agha Salman (50) and Babar Azam (41) gave them a fighting chance.
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