Jasprit Bumrah: I owe my hat-trick to captain
The fast bowler reveals his thoughts after breaking the back of West Indies’ batting line-up on Day Two of the second Test.
Published : Sep 01, 2019 15:04 IST
Jasprit Bumrah, the India fast bowler, told an enamoured Virat Kohli he owed his hat-trick here on Saturday to him.
Bumrah broke the back of the West Indies’ batting line-up by taking six wickets, three of which constituted a hat-trick . He undid the opposition batsmen by his line, length, pace and bounce. After one dismissal, Kohli was caught on the stump microphone as saying: “What a bowler, man! What a bowler.”
Kohli played a key role in the hat-trick. He insisted on a review after Roston Chase was initially not given out by Paul Reiffel, the on-field umpire. The review turned out be successful for the Indian team, and Chase became Bumrah’s third wicket in three deliveries. “Actually I didn’t know, I was not very sure of the appeal, I thought it was bat so I didn’t appeal so much, but it was a good review in the end. So, I think, I owe that hat-trick to the captain,” Bumrah said as Kohli held the microphone for bcci.tv during an interaction.
Read | Harbhajan: Bumrah will be indebted to Virat for hat-trick
It must not be easy to impress Kohli, but Bumrah has done that a few times in the recent past. The second day of the second Test against West Indies was one such day. In a lethal opening spell, Bumrah rattled the opposition by picking up the first five wickets in quick time; three of them came in successive deliveries in the ninth over.
‘Just try and bowl good balls’
“Sometimes when there is so much of help in the wicket, [it is useful for the bowlers]. We saw in the previous innings as well there was a lot of bounce. They were getting a lot of bounce; they were getting late movement as well. So, sometimes, when there is so much of help you can get greedy, you can go for wickets, you can try to be over-aggressive, [at] that time you have to keep things simple, just try and bowl good balls and create pressure. That was the thing that was going on in my head,” Bumrah revealed.
Kohli asked Bumrah about the understanding among the fast bowlers. “Understanding is very good with other pacers. There is a lot of communication that goes on and off the field as well. When I am getting wickets, somebody else’s job at that time is to create pressure; when somebody else is getting wickets my job is to create pressure. So a lot of communication goes — [we discuss] when there is no help what we can do. Ishant has played more than 90 Test matches; [Mohammed] Shami has played a lot of Tests. So lot of ideas come in and then we try to help each other [and] if things are not going well, push each other. So that’s a good relation going on and hopefully we will continue,” Bumrah said.