Why Bumrah is most complete fast bowler ever

BBC News

6 hours ago

It is getting harder and harder to reject the claim that India's Jasprit Bumrah is the most complete fast bowler of all time.The impact he has on a match every time he bowls is remarkable and he has been a cut above anything else we have seen in the first Test at Headingley. Bumrah took 5-83 in England's first innings, along with having three catches dropped and Harry Brook caught off a no-ball.Whenever Bumrah gets the ball in his hand it is box-office viewing. It feels as though something is happening every ball. He makes the bowlers at the other end look as though they are playing a different sport.He can leave the best players in the world confused about what has just happened. A whir of arms, a flick of his wrist, and the ball has hit you before you know it.If I ever had the misfortune of facing Bumrah, he'd be done with me in a maximum of two deliveries. A good short ball, then a searing yorker would do the trick. I'd hold out hope he'd go straight for the second of those options as, by all accounts, it is incredibly hard to see the ball when Bumrah is bowling. He would cause a tailender like me some harm.
Describing a bowler as "hard to pick up" is a phrase you will hear from batters about bowlers with quirky actions. Bowlers who hide the ball from a batter's view until the very last second are horrible to face.With Bumrah, the ball starts in his unique load-up point. Imagine a clock face and Bumrah's action from behind. His fully straightened arm points to the number two. His arm then comes quickly down in to his bowling arc, but as it comes through to deliver, his elbow hyper-extends. This is where he gets some of his pace from - the ball disappears behind his elbow and the batter momentarily loses sight of the ball.Bumrah's forearm then catches up with the rest of his arm, he cocks his wrist and is ready to unleash whatever delivery he has chosen. It's like a catapult. At the very last millisecond, the ball is back in the batter's view, hurtling at somewhere around 90mph.Another challenge to batters and an advantage to Bumrah is his release point. He delivers the ball from closer to the batter than any other pace bowler.Imagine watching a fast bowler from side on. You will see most release the ball when their arm is directly above their front foot. Bumrah somehow gets his hand about 40cm ahead of his front foot, cutting the distance between himself and the batter, thus reducing the batter's reaction time.His approach to the crease is not befitting of someone who is going to bowl fast. Bumrah has short, stuttering steps, without any sort of fluency. There is nothing in the approach that suggests he will be capable of bowling with the speed he does.A batter could watch as many hours of Bumrah footage as they like, yet still be surprised when they face him. There is no 'tell' as to what he going to bowl. No change of arm path, no change of finger position. A batter can only rely on reacting to what is coming their way.
Another phrase you might hear to describe a bowler is "beyond the perpendicular". Again, using the clock face, a bowler with an over-the-top action would, from behind, have it pointing to the number 12, directly above their head. A bowler with a round arm would be at one or two.If a bowler goes beyond the perpendicular, they are coming from the number 11, meaning the angle always feels like it is coming in to a right-hander, making them play at deliveries they might not need to.One example of this would be the success Bumrah has had against Joe Root, dismissing him 10 times in Test cricket - only Australia's Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood have got Root more.Bumrah makes Root push at balls wide of off stump, just like the first innings of this Test, angled in and moving away at the last second once he has opted to play at the ball, continuing in a similar vein to their duels in 2021.Outside of the technical elements of Bumrah's bowling action, I don't think there has been a fast bowler in history able to affect matches so consistently.He is like a computer constantly calibrating what is needed in any given situation, and he is able to implement almost exactly what he wants to with absolute precision.Consider this for versatility. Of pace bowlers from major nations to have sent down at least 500 deliveries in T20 internationals, Bumrah's economy rate of 6.27 is the best. At the same time, Bumrah has comfortably the best bowling average of any bowler in Test history with at least 200 wickets. At 19.33, Bumrah is miles ahead of West Indies legend Malcom Marshall in second place on 20.94.Taking it a stage further, the only bowlers with more than 100 wickets at a lower average than Bumrah all played before World War I.In a climate where the disparity between the Test and T20 formats for bowlers is becoming wider and requiring a differing range of skills, Bumrah is the best in both.Bumrah is a thinker about the game and would have been India's first choice as the new Test captain has it not been for his struggle to play in every match. He took the decision himself to not pursue the job as he did not feel it was fair on the team.We're lucky to be in an era of great fast bowlers. From recent international retirees Stuart Broad and James Anderson, to Kagiso Rabada, Cummins, Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc.Bumrah sits atop of them all as the finest fast bowler to have played the game. Some accolade.