Jasprit Bumrah transcends conditions, pitch and greatness, again

12th March 2022, India and Sri Lanka are engaged in what should be a keenly-contested pink-ball Test at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. The hosts win the toss and have no hesitation in batting first – to the delight of those at the venue.

As soon as Suranga Lakmal sends down the opening over, their decision seems to be vindicated. Not just because Sri Lanka look flat after their defeat at Mohali, but also because the pitch has already started exploding. Bits of the top surface are coming off and puffs of dust are becoming as common as the “India, India” chants in the stands.

Over the course of the next two sessions, that narrative transpires too. Balls pitch in the surface, grip, turn, bounce and perform all sorts of tricks. Batters with excellent defensive techniques are forced to concede defeat and instead, look for run-scoring opportunities, hoping that the big shots will throw the bowlers off their lines and lengths.

Courtesy of Shreyas Iyer’s brilliance, India navigate their way to 252 inside 60 overs – a total that seemed beyond reach at one stage but certainly a total that will send shivers down Sri Lankan spines.

Not just because the tourists have failed to cross 200 even once on this tour, but also because India, if you haven’t noticed, have two world-class spinners (Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja) and Axar Patel, who averages a tick over 11 in Test cricket.

Those at the venue even begin speculating. One of them chirps that Sri Lanka might do well to avoid a follow-on. Another fan chimes in, saying that Axar and Jadeja will pick five wickets each. There is another school of thought suggesting that Ashwin will run through this brittle Sri Lankan batting unit.

There is such conviction in these conversations that those privy to it actually forget that India have two other world-class components in their ranks. Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammad Shami might not want to carry this pitch around wherever they go, but it would be naïve to completely write them off too.

And, when Bumrah rocks up to bowl his first over, almost everyone at the ground is taken aback. This surface is expected to aid spin bowling and even render fast bowlers moot. That, though, is a criteria for the average pacer. Not Bumrah.

In the first over, he poses a few questions. Sri Lanka, however, are still content that they aren’t facing spin from both ends. A couple of overs later, they realize that there simply isn’t any respite. After all, Bumrah is a bowler who transcends conditions, pitches, and at the cost of sounding ridiculous, greatness.

The opening delivery of the third over hangs in the air just enough to entice Kusal Mendis to poke at it. Mendis isn’t the most technically gifted batter Sri Lanka have ever produced but he has a few terrific Test tons to his name.

Hence, when Bumrah makes him hang his bat like a schoolboy cricketer, it isn’t just a wicket, it is a brash proclamation that the track doesn’t even matter to the Mumbai Indians pacer.

A few overs later, Bumrah is up against Lahiru Thirimanne. He angles a few deliveries into the left-handed batter before getting one to deck away just a shade. Thirimanne, like many mere mortals before him, prods at it, hoping that the ball will either miss the edge or land short of the cordon. It doesn’t happen.

Thus, in a matter of minutes, Bumrah had thrown conventional logic and wisdom out of the window. On a strip that was supposed to only support spin bowling, he had broken the game open convincingly – via a combination of fast and smart bowling.

Towards the end of Day 1, Angelo Mathews had begun causing India a bit of grief. The veteran seemed to have gotten on top of the spinners and was picking and choosing his moments to attack brilliantly. Inevitably, Rohit Sharma turned to Bumrah, longing for his IPL teammate to set the cat among the pigeons, again. And, guess what, that’s exactly what happened.

This time, though, he doesn’t rely on the extravagant seam movement he was generating at the start of the essay. Instead, he rolls his fingers over the ball. That, by the way, comes after Mathews has gotten used to an assortment of short and back of a length deliveries.

Hence, when the carrot is dangled outside off stump, Mathews can’t resist the temptation to waft at it. He gets a thick outside edge that is snaffled up by Rohit at second slip, sending thousands at the ground into immediate delirium.

Bumrah, though, isn’t finished. For a bowler who has enjoyed as much success as he has, there has always remained a slight asterisk, considering he has not bowled much in Indian conditions. While it wasn’t exactly a blot on what has otherwise been a spotless record, it was a box that he needed to tick – just to keep those too occupied with records and stats, quiet.

As Day 2 dawns, the discussion is around which spinners India should start with. Ashwin has primarily gotten things underway this series, whereas Jadeja can be a handful against left-handed batters. Oh, and there is Axar too, who has fairly decent pink-ball memories.

Rohit, however, decides that it is Bumrah’s time to shine again. And, the latter doesn’t disappoint. The two scalps on Day 2 (Lasith Embuldeniya and Niroshan Dickwella) aren’t garnered in a manner similar to Day 1. It neither consists of late movement. Nor, does it see the pacer relying on change of pace. Yet, it feels so easy – almost as if Bumrah had it worked out all along.

Jasprit Bumrah picked up a five-wicket haul at Bengaluru

A short-ball trap follows, and it is so obvious that even those at Cubbon Park would’ve known what he was up to. But that is a massive part of his genius.

There are days when batters don’t have a clue about what Bumrah is bringing to the table. On those days, it is acceptable to get outwitted. What sets the fast bowler apart, though, is that there are many days when batters know what Bumrah has in mind.

For example, Thirimanne knew the pacer would target his pads at some point in the second innings. And still, he, like many other batters, couldn’t thwart him.

That is praise of the highest order. He can get wickets when you expect him to. And, he can get them even when you don’t expect him to. He can get wickets when he swarms all over your defences, and he can breach your defences even if you are mindful of that exact threat. Only a handful of pacers in the world can do that.

With Bumrah, there was never any doubt that he would be unsuccessful in Indian conditions. But as long as a five-wicket haul was missing from his burgeoning kitty, it was always going to be used against him in some form. Not anymore.

Not only does he have a five-wicket haul at home, he has it in surroundings that felt as alien to him as any in India. It was a spin bowler’s paradise, and it was a track where spinners were supposed to run riot. It was a strip where fast bowlers should have been rendered moot.

But then again, Bumrah almost always seems to transcend pitches, conditions and of course, greatness, right?