Wills Trophy semifinal a benefit for Bharath Kumar

The Wills Trophy semifinal to be played at Chennai on January 14 will be a benefit match for former Tamil Nadu and South Zone cricketer K Bharath Kumar.

Bharath Kumar, 43, played 27 matches for Tamil Nadu from 1977 to 1983. An accurate medium pace bowler capable of achieving devastating cut from the pitch and movement in the air, he played a leading role in Tamil Nadu's victories during that period. His best performance was at Coimbatore in 1978-79 when he routed Andhra for 29 in the first innings with a bag of five wickets for four runs. He had a total bag of some 80 wickets in the national competition.

Bharath Kumar also represented South Zone in the Duleep Trophy and Deodhar Trophy tournaments and played in the Wills Trophy. He also played for South Zone against Asif Iqbal's Pakistan team in 1979-80 and Keith Fletcher's England team in 1981-82. A brother-in-law of former Indian captain K Srikkanth, Bharath Kumar is currently the coach of the Tamil Nadu Ranji squad.