Bumrah sandbags epic spell

Visakhapatnam: India’s Jasprit Bumrah produced one of the most destructive performances by an Indian pacer ever seen on home soil against England in the second Test here on Saturday. His 6/45 floored the visitors and left everyone spellbound. It was his 10th five-wicket haul in 34 Tests and the fourth time he touched six wickets in an innings.

More than the numbers it was the mode of dismissals that had the cricketing world in awe. The yorker to clean up Ollie Pope and the in-swinger to castle Ben Stokes will be watched in loop and recollected decades later. Bumrah, happy after enhancing his credentials as one of the best all-format fast bowlers in the world currently, said his main goal is to contribute to the team’s success.

"You guys (media) will dissect and sit and decide which spell is good,” said Bumrah at a press conference on Saturday. “But as long as you're able to contribute towards the team and you leave the team in a good space that performance matters the most to me. So be it six wickets be it two wickets. But if you're able to contribute towards the team and you leave the team one step ahead, that is more important.”

What stood out about Bumrah’s performance was the reverse swing — an extremely difficult art to practice — he was able to use it on command. The 30-year-old Bumrah alluded that to the toil of domestic circuit.

“In first-class cricket if you want to take wickets in India you have to learn to bowl reverse swing," he said. "Probably I learned to bowl reverse swing before the conventional swing because you play a lot of cricket on slow wickets. So you understand what you have to do over here. You have to find a way, what are the areas that you have to hit. So, yeah, in the nets, you practice all of those skills and try and execute.”

Bumrah now has every weapon in the armoury but the secret behind his success is the wisdom to pull out the right arrow from his quiver.

When asked how he manages do it so effectively, Bumrah said it’s all about learning from experience. “Test cricket teaches you patience, isn't' it? When you try and bowl magical deliveries now and then it doesn't work. Even if you have everything you don't need to use everything at one particular time. You understand what is working today and what is the need of the hour. If you have a lot of deliveries you can confuse yourself. To shut that noise I focus on one ball at a time and how can I help the team and what is the best ball.”

England opener Zak Crawley too doffed his hat for Bumrah. “Just that reverse. He’s got that pace, the change-ups, he can swing it both ways, but the reverse swing goes a lot later than normal swing. It’s just that little bit harder than normal swing. He was getting it to go a long way today and he bowled some cracking deliveries. Bumrah bowled unbelievably well. Sometimes, you have to hold your hand up and say that’s a fantastic spell in these conditions.”