Indian pacer Jasprit Bumrah is all pumped up for the Centurion Test after a phenomenal Test debut as he has no nervousness at all ahead of the second Test.
Talking about the preparations for the upcoming Test, Bumrah said, “It’s not like in my life I was playing a first-class game for the first time, I have played a lot of four-day games. There was a discussion that I would play the match, so I was talking to our bowling coach what kind of things I should do, what kind of wickets are over here or what should I expect.”
But despite his enormous self-belief and a tangible lack of stage-fright, it took him some time getting used to the conditions, he said, “It’s always challenging whenever you come to a new country, the wickets are different, the weather is different.”
However, Jasprit didn’t shirk away from the challenge and made quick changes in the second innings. If in the first innings, he was guilty of bowling a little too full, rather than hit the deck hard as he customarily does in first-class cricket back home, he found his bearings in the second innings and picked three scalps.
The evident difference was the length, as he began asking questions to the batsmen with back-of-length deliveries. He revealed as much: “In the first innings, we thought we bowled a little fuller than the normal because in India the wickets are different where we have to pitch fuller to get the swing and to get the batsmen on the front foot. Over here there is the bounce, there is a little bit of difference. We analyzed that and tried to adopt that in the second innings.”
Despite making a decisive impact in the second innings, especially nailing the crucial wickets of Faf du Plessis and AB de Villiers, he specifies he’s not getting carried away. He said, “It is not a dream debut. Whatever I learned from the first match I was happy as a bowler. As a bowler, you look to get his first wicket as early as possible and I got AB. It was happy, and from there on we took a lot more wickets. Not to get too excited and not to get too down after every match is my motto and take the confidence into the next match.”
Bumrah also credited bowling coach Bharat Arun, as he said, “He has seen me since the time I walked in as a U19 boy at the NCA where he was the coach. He knows me and gives me good advice. He knows my bowling and as a player, it is good to have a coach who knows my strengths and weakness.”
Though he was non-committal on the nature of the Centurion strip, Bumrah said, “We are focusing on our preparation for as wicket go, I have not played over here and as far as net wicket goes, there is a lot of bounce.”
