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I could have taken more wickets: Harbhajan

November 23, 2010 16:50 IST

India off-spinner Harbhajan Singh on Tuesday said he was satisfied to score runs but his bowling was not up to the standard in the three-match Test series against New Zealand. 

Harbhajan scored 315 runs, comprising of two centuries and a fifty, and claimed only 10 wickets in the three-match series to help India beat New Zealand 1-0 but the offie said he was not happy with his wicket haul. 

Harbhajan Singh"It was satisfying to score runs with the bat but I could have taken a few more wickets,"

Harbhajan said after India thrashed New Zealand by an innings and 198 runs in the third Test, at Nagpur on Tuesday.

"I bowled well but the number of wickets that I got, I feel it is lower than my standard. I would have been happy with 15-16 wickets in the series," he added. 

Harbhajan heaped praise on his colleagues for producing a brilliant bowling performance to bundle out New Zealand for 175 in their second innings. 

"Ojha bowled well, Raina chipped in with wickets. Ishant (Sharma) and Sreesanth also bowled very well. It was a performance by everyone that mattered at the end," he said. Harbhajan said he was looking forward to the South Africa series next month but cautioned it would a challenging series. 

"South Africa is going to be very challenging. We have to play much better than we did in this series. If we play to our potential and capabilities, we can definitely win in South Africa," he said. Man-of-the-match Rahul Dravid, who slammed 191 to help India pile up a mammoth 566/8 declared in their first innings, said it was the bowlers who set up the win for them.

"It was a good series, had to work hard for runs. To get the sort of result we did today was sweet. The bowlers set up the match for us. I think it was the best wicket we got in the series. There was bounce when the ball was new, and turn later as we saw it today," he said.

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