Jasprit Bumrah unleashes new weapons

Fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah has become an indispensable part of the limited overs set-up owing to his exceptional death-bowling skills. The way he’s been adding weapons to his armoury when dressed in whites, he may become a permanent member of the Test team too.

In every game of his five appearances in Tests, the fast-learning 24-year-old has been unleashing a new weapon from his armoury that vindicates the team management’s immense faith in him as the next big thing.

While in South Africa, making his Test debut, he gave an indication of his raw pace, in the previous Test at Nottingham the Gujarat pacer showed his enormous lung capacity — bowling marathon spells without losing pace. On the opening day of the ongoing fourth Test at Ageas Bowl, Burmah unveiled a new weapon — the in-swinger to the left-hander.

Bumrah is brilliant against the right-handers, his natural darting-in line cramping them for room. With the pace too being hot, batsmen often struggle to impose themselves on him. But Bumrah has put the left-handers on alert mode now with a sensational new weapon that moved in back to Keaton Jennings, leaving him dumbfounded. After forcing Jennings to leave all the balls harmlessly, Bumrah swung one back in sharply. Caught by surprise, Jennings offered no shot to be trapped leg-before-wicket. Initially even commentators — all former greats — were befuddled, wondering if Bumrah had actually attempted such a ball. But when they studied it deeply, they realised Bumrah had harnessed it thoroughly before making Jennings the first victim.

Bumrah, who ended the day with a haul of 3/46, said having plenty of weapons in the armoury makes one very dangerous.

“There's always a lot of hard work. Because I try to always learn new things and add them to my armoury. It’s good to have a lot of options because you're always in a good space when you're bowling in the match. That is always my aim. I never get happy that I've got all the deliveries. I want to keep on improving and add new deliveries to my armoury so that it helps me in the match situation.”

Bumrah also said people wrongly perceive him as a one-dimensional bowler but he believes in using all his weapons judiciously.

“I usually have the in-swinger (to the left-hander) and the out-swinger to the right-hander. I bowled that to Chris Gayle in the World T20 semifinal as well. It's not a new delivery. When you have too many options, you don't want to use all of them in a single day. Whenever you feel that option is suitable, you use it.”

For a guy playing just his fifth Test match, Bumrah has shown remarkable maturity. He’s a fast learner with a very sound cricketing mind.