As India readied for their first practice session at the Arun Jaitley Stadium ahead of the T20 World Cup clash against Namibia on Thursday, all eyes were understandably on Jasprit Bumrah, who had missed the opener against the USA in Mumbai on Saturday on account of illness.
Leading into Tuesday night’s stint, Bumrah hadn’t bowled for more than a week; his last bowl competitively was eminently forgettable as he went for 58 runs off his four overs against New Zealand, the most runs he has conceded in his 87 T20I appearances.
Bumrah took a few tentative steps before breaking into an easily recognisable stutter-start jog. After more stretches which eventually convinced him that he had loosened up enough to hit the bowling crease, he bowled for the better part of 30 minutes with the intensity that one has come to expect off him, an intensity on which he makes no compromises even in a training session.
It wasn’t Bumrah at his absolute best. Like they have for some time now, the yorkers refused to do his bidding, often ending up as full tosses that were put away with impunity by Tilak Varma. There were a couple of mean bouncers and he tested the outside edge of Suryakumar Yadav more than once. The rhythm didn’t come flooding back, but the signs were encouraging.
Bumrah will be key to India’s chances.
| Photo Credit:
PTI
Bumrah will be better off with a few overs in a competitive setting, which is precisely what will greet him on Thursday night.
Around his back injuries which have now become a constant if singularly unwelcome companion, or more likely because of it, India have handled their most valuable cricketing treasure with care and caution.
A flare-up of the back injury that prevented him from bowling in the final innings of the five-Test series in Australia in January last year has compelled the think-tank to manage his workload with greater diligence than it would have in any case. The injury forced him to miss the Champions Trophy in Dubai in February-March as well as the early part of IPL 2025.
Because of the imperativeness of making sure that he is rested enough, his captaincy credentials were overlooked once Rohit Sharma retired from Test cricket.
Wrapped in cotton wool
Bumrah played in only three of five Tests in England last summer in Shubman Gill’s first series as India’s red-ball skipper. He did subsequently feature in all four of the home Tests, against the West Indies and South Africa, but even in white-ball cricket, India have been loath to use Bumrah liberally.
The 32-year-old hasn’t featured in a single One-Day International since the final of the 50-over World Cup more than two and a quarter years ago, while even his T20I appearances have been sporadic. Bumrah figured in only 17 of the 41 T20 games India played between the two World Cups; he is also the lone exception to the Board of Control for Cricket in India diktat necessitating players to represent their state (Gujarat, in his case) in domestic cricket when not consumed by national duty.
Evidently, Bumrah is every bit worth the ‘special’ treatment simply because of how special he is, and how much he brings to the table not just as the best all-format pacer of his generation but as a seasoned, wise and intelligent head also willing to play the role of guide and mentor without hesitation or prodding.
That being said, Bumrah hasn’t been at his consistently most potent or threatening in his now-on, mostly-off appearances since the final of the last T20 World Cup in June 2024. Thrice in his last 15 bowls alone, he has gone at more than 11 runs per over as opposed to just four times in his previous 69 innings. At the Asia Cup in Dubai in September, he was taken apart by Sahibzada Farhan, the Pakistan opener who smacked him for sixes for fun during an Indian experiment that saw Bumrah bowl three overs in the PowerPlay for the first time since 2017.
When it comes to others, an economy of 11-plus three times in 15 innings is hardly worth a mention, but Bumrah clearly isn’t ‘others’. Great champions are often victims of their own standards; two of those 11-plus efforts came in his last six visits to the bowling crease. He finished with none for 45 against South Africa in Mullanpur in December and none for 58 in his last T20I, against New Zealand in Thiruvananthapuram on January 31.
These matches, as well as all others during India’s final two series before the World Cup, were played on absolute belters and there was no shame in going the distance. But around and between these two matches, he also had two for 17 off three overs in Cuttack, two for 17 off four in Ahmedabad and three for 17, also off four in Guwahati. Safe to presume then that 17 is Bumrah’s golden number?
The pitches at this World Cup have been anything but shirtfronts. There appears a greater balance between bat and ball than in bilateral faceoffs and 12 matches in the first four days produced a solitary score of more than 200. In any case, traditionally, matches have been lower-scoring in multi-team tournaments compared to bilateral showdowns, which isn’t the worst development at a time when the race to 300 is getting more and more frenzied.
Against this backdrop, India need Bumrah to be at his incisive best over the next three and a half weeks. He was forced to miss the opening T20 World Cup game against the USA through illness, bringing Mohammed Siraj immediately into play on his return to the T20I side after a year and a half in the wilderness.
Siraj’s belated inclusion stemmed from an unfortunate knee injury that ended Harshit Rana’s World Cup even before it started. Even though he returned his second best T20I figures of three for 29 against the Americans, the Hyderabadi will in all likelihood warm the bench on Thursday when India continue their campaign against Namibia.
Bumrah will want to get into the competition as quickly as possible. He was the engine room on whom Rohit Sharma’s side rode piggyback in the Americas nearly 20 months ago; Bumrah was incisive, parsimonious, intelligent, always threatening and rose to the occasion when the team needed him most.
It was his dismissal of Mohammad Rizwan that scuttled Pakistan’s chase of 120 on a decidedly dodgy New York surface. Pakistan were 80 for three after 14 overs when Rizwan was bowled swinging across the line. From then on, Babar Azam’s side added just 33 runs in 35 deliveries to finish on 113 for seven to go down by six runs.
Typically, in keeping with his status as a genius, Bumrah saved his best for last. Through Heinrich Klaasen, South Africa were running away with the final. A 24-run 15th over from Axar Patel left the Proteas needing 30 from as many deliveries with six wickets in hand when, in a final throw of the dice, Rohit turned to his hitman.
Bumrah didn’t provide a breakthrough, but he did provide a semblance of control by going for just four. It was still South Africa’s game to win at 26 off 24 when Klaasen fell to Hardik Pandya. Rohit chose to bowl Bumrah out in the 18th over, knowing that the game was on a razor’s edge and it was imperative to seize the moment. Bumrah responded like only he can – a mere two runs and the wicket of Marco Jansen meant South Africa had suddenly gone from the hunter to the hunted. Having produced a peach with the new ball to pluck out Reeza Hendricks’ off-stump in his first over, Bumrah’s final burst of 2-0-6-1 gave him match figures of 4-0-18-2. Bumrah was rewarded for his sustained brilliance throughout the competition with the Player-of-the-Tournament award. Arshdeep Singh and Afghanistan’s Fazalhaq Farooqi topped the wicket-takers’ chart with 17 wickets apiece. Bumrah had the joint second most scalps, alongside Anrich Nortje, but his 15 wickets combined with an economy rate of 4.17 – no one else with more than 10 wickets went at less than 5.74 an over – clearly singled him out as the most influential performer across the length of the World Cup.
Determined for more
As India seek to rewrite history by becoming the first team to win the World Cup thrice, the first side to successfully defend the trophy and the first outfit to triumph on home soil, it is a no-brainer that Suryakumar and the remaining 13 squad members will want Bumrah to be at his marauding best.
Bumrah has shown himself to be capable of lifting his already remarkable game to a higher level at continental and global tournaments. One isn’t sure what the future holds for him, but in front of adoring thousands on his home patch, he will be determined to leave his imprint on the World Cup again.
Despite his and his colleagues’ best efforts, India stumbled at the final hurdle in the 50-over World Cup. Bumrah will leave no stone unturned in trying to ensure that there is no unwelcome encore while being well aware that the path to the knockouts itself is fraught with pesky obstacles.
Bumrah was named the Player-of-the-Tournament in the previous edition of the T20 World Cup.
| Photo Credit:
Ritu Raj Konwar
With no disrespect, Namibia are the perfect launchpad for Bumrah ahead of the marquee Sunday showdown against Pakistan in Colombo, just recently greenlit by the Pakistan government. If the formbook holds and India maintain their wonderful T20 run, they should find themselves in the Super Eights where the quality of their opponents will be consistently higher than what they will encounter in Group A.
Bumrah will target the next three fixtures to get his game in order. Of late, he hasn’t been nailing his yorkers with the same regularity as in the past and even at nets on Tuesday, several of them manifested themselves in low to not-so-low full tosses.
To erase that anomaly will be high on his priority list because Bumrah is a proud perfectionist who hates letting himself, his team and his legion of fans down, in that order.
