Praveen Kumar had everything to become a domestic cricket legend: limited pace but ability to swing the ball both ways, persistence to bowl long spells, and an almost intuitive knowledge of how to take wickets on unresponsive Indian wickets.

But he took his limited pace and remarkably smart application of that ability to a higher level, claiming 10 wickets in four matches in his debut ODI series, including a match-winning spell against Australia in the final of the 2007-08 CB Series.