While the famed Jasprit Bumrah yorker – now a sight to behold at the international level – first wowed the world on the IPL stage, it isn’t a variation he learnt from scratch alongside Lasith Malinga at Mumbai Indians, contrary to popular opinion.

Instead, it is a home-grown delivery, an accidental product of the limitations he grew up around while dreaming to be a fast bowler.

Into his fifth year as an Indian international, Bumrah’s gangly action and unwavering accuracy has garnered accolades galore, with the crowning highlight specifically being his pinpoint full deliveries. As a child, however, the ball was utilised in an attempt to keep his indoor practice area quiet, not batsmen, ensuring he didn’t invite the wrath of his mother, as revealed by him in an interview with the Hindustan Times.

A young Bumrah, growing up in the town of Ahmedabad, had little space to practice a full-scale bowling action inside his house, something which also contributed to his short run-up. The yorker was another by-product of the interior layout, as Bumrah would aim at hitting the edge between the wall and the floor consistently with his bowling action.

The crafty method ensured he did not draw the annoyance of his mother, minimising the possibility of any sound produced by the bouncing of the ball on the floor and then the wall.

Outside, with a rubber ball in his hand [a common alternative on Indian streets, owing to its viability on barren grounds, and low cost], Bumrah used to jam deliveries full at the batsmen as part of a forced strategy.

“We had rubber balls, super tight ones, with a seam, it used to swing,” Bumrah was quoted as saying. “We did not play on pitches, so there was no seam movement or length balls or caught behinds. It was all about trying to hit the batsman on the full.

“If you want to take wickets you have to bowl yorkers. I still believe that’s what makes me street smart, because it’s very easy to get hit when you’re playing rubber ball. As a bowler you have to find out ways of how not to get hit.”

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Bumrah’s toe-crushers have caused batsmen all over the world plenty of bother, with the magic lying in his ability to slip it in at the right time, and there are several instances of it – be it his two stunning yorkers against Bangladesh during the 2019 World Cup, or the wily slower yorker that bamboozled Shaun Marsh during India’s successful tour Down Under in 2018/19.

“I do it again and again and again in the nets. So the more you do it, you get decent at it. You can’t master it,” Bumrah told PTI last year. “You are still trying to get better at it, yeah. It’s all about repetition. It’s like any other ball.”

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International CricketJasprit Bumrah