New Zealand gave tough competition to the Indian team in the recently concluded ODI series, but the Blackcaps’ coach Mike Hesson was all praise for Indian pacers Jasprit Bumrah and Bhuvneshwar Kumar. The pacers put the brakes on Kiwi batsmen when they were going great guns, to win the match by 6-runs.

Talking to Cricbuzz on Sunday, Hesson said, “A year ago we were playing the decider and got bowled out for 67 [79] chasing 260 [270], so to put that into context, to be chasing a formidable total like that and to put in a performance (like that) shows how the team is evolving.”

Talking about Indian bowlers, Hesson said, “[Jasprit] Bumrah was exceptional in the end. It was always going to be difficult. We got it down to 25 off two overs. When you’ve got a score like 338, you want to see yourself up to have a small chase like that but you know that with Bhuvneshwar and Bumrah, who are probably two of the three best yorker bowlers in the world, so was always going to challenge. We got them to miss a couple of times and were able to take advantage of that but not quite at the end. It was one hell of a chase; disappointing to fall short.”

Hesson also did commend the job done by opener Colin Munro he said, “We tried to get ourselves to a Twenty20 situation really. We thought if we could reduce the chase to 170 off the last 20 then with wickets in hand, we’re in with a good chance. In the end, we needed about 163 off the last 20 through some exceptional batting from a number of players. Munro certainly gave us the impetus at the top and got us ahead of the run rate early which made it easy for the guys coming in.”

Coach Mike Hesson concluded by praising the Kiwi bowlers, he said, “They certainly respect Mitch over here. They know he’s a quality bowler so don’t take too many risks against him. Not great surfaces, not ones that we’re used to but Trent Boult’s spell in Mumbai, Tim [Southee] was very good today, Adam [Milne] in Pune was getting close to his best, so there’s some very good signs.”