London:Jasprit Bumrah loves to pick his moments. On Friday afternoon, he led the Indian team off the field after having picked up another five-wicket haul and having had his name etched on the prestigious honours board at Lord’s. It was a display of how he could work with ground and overhead conditions to make things happen. When he sat out of the previous Test at Edgbaston due to workload concerns, the conversation centred around how he may have just preserved himself to perform on one of the biggest stages in world cricket. He played a pivotal role in India’s memorable Test win here in 2021, with figures of 3/33 in the second innings. On Friday, Bumrah conquered Lord’s with figures of 5/74 — one more milestone in his journey to pace-bowling greatness. Bumrah thinks a lot about his game. Owing to a vulnerable back, he is forever analysing how he can optimise his services for India. At the same time, he also has to mentor a young pace attack. “It’s just a simple plan for us. Boom bhai (Bumrah) leads the bowling unit. He just told us to be patient and do the good work as much as we can. It was about staying patient,” Nitish Kumar Reddy had said after a hard-fought first day on Thursday.
That he could play with the minds of the batters was evident in the very first ball of the second day’s play. Joe Root, batting on 99 overnight and obviously eager to get to his hundred, was lured with a full and wide away swinger. Even as Root’s unconvincing drive escaped the third slip and gully fielders to the boundary, the smirk on the faces of the Indian players gave away the trap that they had laid. Cracking the slope here was one of the challenges for the Indian bowlers. Over the last two days, Bumrah was actively involved in rotating his fellow bowlers to make sure India had the best chance to keep a check on England. Bumrah decided to bowl from the Nursery end on Friday instead of the Pavilion End like he did on Thursday. He was taking the new ball away from the left-handers on Day One. With the second new ball early on Day Two, he went round the wicket to Ben Stokes and brought it back sharply down the slope to hit the stumps.
Poll
Which wicket taken by Bumrah at Lord’s was the most crucial?
Two overs later, he left the cover area open for Root and got the ball to jag back up the slope. Root, expecting the ball to at least hold its line, went for an expansive drive, only to drag it back on to his stumps. The next ball went the other way to get Chris Woakes’ outside edge to the wicketkeeper. Bumrah got his fifth wicket by bringing the ball back up the slope to hit Jofra Archer’s stumps. He did it the other way to dismiss Harry Brook, using the slope to bring the ball back into him on Thursday. It was here in England, on a bus ride during the Champions Trophy in 2017, that he had told then-national selector Devang Gandhi that he didn’t want to end up as just another fast bowler to have played well for India. He wanted to be known as the best bowler in the world. Not that he needs any validation at this point of career, but these two days at Lord’s have only established his place as the top-ranked Test bowler in the world.
