IND vs NZ: Harshal Patel avers 'Progress doesn’t happen overnight' after sensational debut

There is a saying in Hindi, 'Sabar ka phal meetha hota hai' which roughly translates to 'the fruit of patience is sweet' and the same is true for Harshal Patel. His hard work finally paid off as he made his Team India debut during India vs New Zealand 2nd T20I on Friday. After grinding through domestic and franchise cricket, the pacer finally made the opportunity count bagging 'Man of the Match' award in his very first match. Following the match-winning performance, Harshal Patel spoke about how he has been patient all these years and waited for this opportunity.

India vs New Zealand: Harshal Patel reflects on struggle before earning maiden cap

Speaking about the performance during India vs New Zealand 2nd T20I, Patel said, “All the failures I’ve had through these ten years have taught me that you need to be patient, you need to understand your game, you need to understand conditions and if there’s something that works for you, if you’ve figured a process that works for you, you need to stick to it.”

He further added, “You continue to make mistakes and you realise at some point that you have to change your mindset, you have to change the way you look at things, you have to change the way you approach things. That is something that my process of ten years in domestic cricket has taught me."

Harshal Patel's success with the ball comes after years of honing his bowling craft and realising long-term goals. He was instrumental in RCB making the playoff in IPL 2021 picking up 32 wickets. Speaking about keeping patience all these years, Patel said, “The most underrated thing (is that) people don’t talk enough about patience. I feel progress doesn’t happen overnight. It’s a slow process. It’s a gradual process and if you want to make a change and if you want to get better at something you need to allow yourself enough time to figure that out.  It takes a while for you to inculcate those things in your thought process. It’s going to take time and if you keep jumping from one place to another in your mindset that’s never going to work for you."

Harshal Patel stats

Talking about Harshal Patel stats the right-handed pacer has played 64 first-class matches in which he has taken 226 wickets. In T20, Patel played 117 matches picking up 140 wickets. He is also quite handy with the bat scoring 1363 runs in First-Class cricket, while in T20 format he has 931 runs.