Twelve overs and three wickets into the Asia Cup, Jasprit Bumrah is set to take up the mantle of the spearhead of a dangerous India pace attack at the World Cup.
Kusal Mendis had survived a soft call for leg-before first ball, but had played out the rest of that over from Jasprit Bumrah. At the other end, he had hit Mohammed Siraj for four.
For the first time in history, India had lost all ten wickets in an ODI to spinners – five of them to Dunith Wellalage, barely out of his teens, and four to Charith Asalanka, with one wicket in 78 matches.
Dasun Shanaka had read the pitch well. His three fast bowlers – himself included – had sent down 11 overs out of 49.1. India, too, had replaced Shardul Thakur with Axar Patel.
If spin was going to decide this match, why not score as many runs as possible before they came on? Dimuth Karunaratne would bat through, of course, for few can play quality spin in these conditions as well. The attack had to come from the other end.
Mendis defends the first ball of Bumrah’s third over. Bumrah pitches the next ball on a length. Mendis goes for a violent pull for a ball too full for the shot: it takes the top edge and soars over first slip for four.
Predetermined? Almost certainly. High-risk? Perhaps. But four runs nevertheless, and if Sri Lanka take a sizeable chunk of that 215 before the spinners came on, that will perhaps mean one fewer fielder near the bat.
Two balls later, Mendis plays another predetermined stroke. This time, he stays back to a ball too full to not come forward. He gets a single, but not off a shot coaches would have advised.
There is no action at the other end. Siraj, who has replaced Mohammed Shami as Bumrah’s new-ball partner, bowls a maiden. Karunaratne middles five of the balls and leaves the other alone. It might have been a Test match.
Bumrah pitches up. The ball curls into Mendis, who goes for it. He does not middle it, but clears the thirty-yard circle. The ball lands harmlessly, then rolls past the rope.
Bumrah responds like most fast bowlers – almost: he alters the length, but it is not a bouncer. The short-pitched ball whizzes above Mendis’ horizontal blade, as he is too late on the cut.
Bumrah has pitched up. Mendis has mistimed. Bumrah has bowled short. Mendis has swung and missed. What next? Ah, of course, the yorker – the “best in the world” – at 140 kph.
Mendis probably expects this too, for he keeps it out – never an easy task when the ball comes at serious pace from inside the imaginary vertical line above the bowler’s head. It is not something you grow up learning to play.
Back home in India, around the world, fans had waited for the unprecedented eleven-month gap India had spent without their spearhead, checking for updates on one of the greatest cricketers the country has known.
They celebrated when Bumrah had returned to lead India against Ireland. Two T20Is, eight overs, four wickets, Player of the Match as well as Series – he was there, but not quite, for the World Cup was near, and that would require ten overs of bowling and another forty of fielding.
They waited to watch him bowl at Pakistan, but rain denied them that. They waited to watch him bowl at Nepal, but he returned home for the birth of his child. They again waited to watch him bowl at Pakistan. They waited some more, for rain pushed the match into the reserve day.
And when he finally bowled, it was while defending a target of 357 with an outstanding pace attack supporting him. The cushion reduced Bumrah’s searing opening spell to a five-over burst of little consequence to the match… but not to India’s World Cup prospects.
Bumrah was quick that night. He moved the ball both in the air and off the surface. He kept beating the outside edges of the two Pakistani left-handed openers. Upon Imam-ul-Haq’s protests, he took off his elbow strap. About an over later, he had Imam caught at slip.
My phone trilled. “Curtly Ambrose, Dean Jones,” read the WhatsApp message. The parallel was too obvious to miss, but Bumrah smiles. He does not snarl. There is no retaliatory bouncer barrage. If anything, the length is impeccable throughout the spell.
The spell was forgotten, for Siraj bowled magnificently as well, as did Thakur and Hardik Pandya, and Kuldeep Yadav snared five wickets.
But now, with only 214 to defend, India needs Bumrah at his best. And he does begin well, swinging the ball both into and away from Pathum Nissanka.
All of India gasps when Bumrah loses his footing while bowling the fourth ball of the night. The next ball is wide and over-pitched, and Nissanka puts it away for four. Bumrah overcompensates with a wide down the leg-side.
The fans are unhappy – not about the five runs scored off one legal ball but for something much, much more significant: Why did they have to pick him the day after he bowled five overs? What if he slips while fielding on this wet ground?
Bumrah takes out Nissanka next over to begin his duel with Mendis. Runs come. Wickets do not. Now, having already hit a four in the over and another in the previous one, Mendis holds the upper hand.
He waits for the ball, but his wait is unlike what the Indian fans had to endure. This is the wait of a split second, the extra time a 120 kph ball takes when you expect it to come at 140.
Ask Shaun Marsh. Ask Ollie Robinson. They know.
Mendis is too early into his shot. The ball lobs harmlessly to Suryakumar Yadav at cover. Mendis begins to peel himself away from the crease, but waits for the umpires. The replays rule him out.
It's BOOM TIME! 💥⌚
Clever piece of bowling by @Jaspritbumrah93, foxing the batter with a wonderfully disguised slower one! 😮
Tune-in to #AsiaCupOnStar, LIVE NOW on Star Sports Network#INDvSL #Cricket pic.twitter.com/A3Scx3jcFZ
— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) September 12, 2023
Bumrah gets a breather after a spell of 5-1-21-2. He returns later in the night for two overs, this time to two set batters. There is a half-volley that Dhananjaya de Silva puts away for four, but there is also a slower ball that balloons into an empty space, and a ball too quick enough to cramp him for room.
India win before they can test him at the death. For nearly a year, the fast bowlers have stepped up in his absence. Since the start of 2023, the Indian pacers average 21.98, the best in the world, and are the only attack to have taken a wicket at under every 25 balls.
Bumrah returned to reclaim the right to bowl the first over, pushing Shami out of the XI and Prasidh Krishna of the squad. It has been only 12 overs of bowling, but he is back where he used to be.
