Battle-ready: leader Bumrah will thrive in the skipper’s hat Premium

Jasprit Bumrah, the professor of fast bowling, takes on the challenge of leading India in a Test series against Australia.

Jasprit Bumrah could so easily have been a professor. He is already a professor, many will say, a professor of fast bowling, if an unconventional one at that. But he could have also gone into teaching and made a fabulous job of it.

You only have to listen to him at a press conference if you entertain any doubts. He speaks slowly, thoughtfully and with tremendous clarity, breaking things down to such levels of simpleness that even the slowest can comfortably keep track. Occasionally, he might give off the impression that he is talking down even if that is not the intention, because Jasprit Bumrah is not cut from that cloth.

On Friday morning at the impressive if intimidating Optus Stadium in Perth, Bumrah will walk out for the toss with Pat Cummins to herald the start of the first five-Test series between India and Australia in Australia since 1991-92. It won’t be Bumrah’s debut as Test captain – he performed that role in Birmingham in June 2022 when Rohit Sharma was down with Covid – but it will still be a special moment for someone who has come on so much in such a short time in international cricket.

Fast-bowler-captains are a rarity in Test cricket, for whatever reason. Maybe they shoulder such a demanding workload that the decision-makers feel they are best left to their own devices, to rest and recuperate physically and mentally between overs instead of having to worry about bowling changes and field placements and stuff like that.

It’s not as if there haven’t been long-term skippers who have been pace bowlers – the Pakistan trio of Imran Khan, Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis headlines a list that includes, among others, Kapil Dev, Ian Botham, Bob Willis, Courtney Walsh, Shaun Pollock, Mashrafe Mortaza and, more recently, Tim Southee – but they haven’t been as many as batting-captains, one of the many quirks Test cricket in particular keeps throwing up.

Bumrah’s first tilt at Test captaincy ended in a resounding seven-wicket loss with England chasing down more than 375 in the fourth innings with utter impunity. Despite the result, Bumrah professed to enjoying that responsibility. He will need to be on point every inch of the way, starting from Friday, if India are to make a strong start to their campaign in the absence of Rohit and regular No. 3 Shubman Gill, as well as Bumrah’s pace-partner-in-crime for many years now, Mohammed Shami.

The (capt) against his name is merely an official affirmation of Bumrah’s standing in the Indian cricketing firmament. He has been a leader in his own right almost from the time he made his Test debut in South Africa in 2018, slipping effortlessly not only into the pace spearhead’s capacity but also sharing his inherent wisdom and ever-expanding knowledge around, taking over a mentoring role very early in his career and clearly relishing it.