Ex-Indian cricketer and coach Ravi Shastri shared about Jasprit Bumrah’s passion. He longed for a spot in Test cricket, aiming to stand out. He initially gained fame as a ‘white-ball expert’. Now, this right-arm bowler tops the International Cricket Council (ICC) Test bowler rankings. Plus, he’s a key player for Team India, both home and away.
Bumrah, displayed an ideal mix for short-format cricket with his bag of tricks and knack for delivering yorkers. He initially spent his years in Team India playing ODIs and T20Is. Along with this, he played for the Mumbai Indians (MI) in the Indian Premier League (IPL).
His major break in the red ball format came as a result of Ravi Shastri and then-captain Virat Kohli’s joint ambition of building a pace battery capable of succeeding in international circumstances.
“I remember my first call to him, it was in Kolkata. I asked him would he be interested in Test cricket. He said that would be the biggest day of his life. He was labeled as a white-ball cricketer without asking him. But I knew. I wanted to see how hungry he was. I told him to get ready, be prepared. I told him I was going to unleash him in South Africa,” Shastri said in an interview with former England skipper Michael Atherton for The Times.
“He was desperate to play Test cricket with Virat Kohli. They know, at the end of the day, no one remembers white ball averages. They will always remember your numbers in Test cricket.”
Ravi Shastri
Jasprit Bumrah made his first appearance in the inaugural Test of the 2018 South Africa tour in Cape Town. He achieved four wickets during this debut. Notably, he also garnered a five-wicket triumph during the landmark victory at The Wanderers.
Since then, he has been a continuous fixture in the Men in Blue’s seam-bowling unit, contributing significantly to numerous of the team’s memorable overseas victories, including those in Melbourne, Nottingham, and Cape Town.
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Our cherished Team India built a strong speed bowling group, including Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, and Mohammed Siraj eventually joining.
This fast bowling team contributed to India’s exceptional performance in red-ball cricket, particularly abroad. Shastri and Kohli’s shared thinking was indeed a key contributor.
Ravi Shastri recalled the team’s no-holds-barred stance on pacers during the net session.
“We were on the same page and wanted a battery of fast bowlers. He was ready for a scrap. He wanted to play hard. We made it a free-for-all in the nets. You were allowed to bounce the s**t out of anyone. He was the first guy to embrace it; he was quite prepared to look ugly in the nets and the mindset changed.”
Ravi Shastri
Despite the well-documented paucity of ICC hardware, the Shastri-Kohli combination led to a dominant phase in Indian cricket. They created a solid basis on which the Men in Blue continue to thrive, while also ensuring that the transition period goes as smoothly as possible.
Shastri reserved respect for the former captain, describing him as a ‘uncut diamond’ when he first took over the squad.
“There was a lot of individual brilliance but I wanted to see team brilliance. I wanted to win and to make Test cricket paramount and identified an uncut diamond in Virat Kohli. While (MS) Dhoni was my captain, my eye was on him (Kohli). I told him very early in my second month: ‘It’ll take time but watch, observe, be ready (for the captaincy).”
Ravi Shastri
Under Virat Kohli captaincy, Team India won a Test series in Australia, among other important foreign Test victories, advanced to the semi-finals of every ICC competition until the 2021 T20 World Cup, and maintained their dominance in bilateral and home Test matches.