Cricket news - Zampa exudes confidence after winning the Kohli matchup

Adam Zampa is ready for another round of combat with Virat Kohli, the world's top-ranked player whom he's accounted for on four occasions across 13 meetings. On this particular tour alone, Zampa has had Kohli twice - in the first T20I in Visakhapatnam and then in the first ODI in Hyderabad - and knows that he will need to do much more for continued success against a batsman of Kohli's calibre.

"He's one guy we always spend a little bit of extra time talking about in team meetings. It's good for the confidence, it's exciting to get a player like that out," Zampa said on Monday (March 4) ahead of the second ODI in Nagpur. "But it's also one of those things where he probably won't want to get out to me again so I don't know if he's going to do a bit more thinking about it. I'm going to have to bowl even better this game.

"If you look at the last few games, I didn't get any wickets but felt like I bowled really well and kept it simple and felt like wickets were round the corner. So it was a confidence boost to get a couple of big wickets the other night. But now the Indians will be more aware of what I'm doing."

Zampa has long been in and out of the Australian side, but a continuous run in recent times has helped him feel more confident, allowing him to grow into the role of an attacking spinner - an indispensable entity in the modern-day ODI ecosystem.

"I feel like the last time I came to India 18 months ago, I wasn't really bowling well. I was low on confidence .. and we were a bit underdone, we hadn't played much cricket ," Zampa admitted. "Ball is coming out nicely [this time around]. I have tried to evaluate the conditions as best as possible. I have been playing a lot of cricket this summer and I'm playing here much more, getting used to the conditions."

Zampa credited spin coach Sridharan Sriram for the variations which have got him the wickets on this tour. "Sri has got the experience here and the knowledge. In Australia I tend to bowl a little bit more top-spinners and wrong'uns whereas here I'm probably a bit more out the front, a bit of side spin. Sliders with a little bit of leg-spin, I'm finding in the nets it worked. And I got a wicket like that the other night in the first game - Kohli was the one that went straight on," Zampa said. "Most legspinners in one-day cricket these days are attacking the stumps, and that's my strength. As soon as I get away from the stumps to guys like Virat, that's when the damage happens. I am going to try and work on staying away from their strengths."

On captain Aaron Finch, who's been going through an extended run of poor form, Zampa pointed out to Finch's experience, and how they would be worse for the lack of it.

"If you ask Aaron, he'd agree that he's not in the best form of his life, but in terms of morale, he's been unbelievable," Zampa said when asked if Finch's form is affecting the team's morale. "He hasn't captained a lot for Australia but he's done a really good job to keep himself really good for the team.

"Aaron is a world class player. We have seen guys like Virat and Dhoni - at the end of the day, their experience has been the difference between us and them [here and] in Australia. So Finch's experience is going to be the difference for us going forward. We know he's going to turn it around."