India vs SA: Bumrah sizzles on first Test bow at Eden with 16th fifer

The selection of India’s playing eleven for the first Test raised several eyebrows all around at the start of the day. It was as if the team management was trying to prove all speculation wrong about the team composition, unleashing all four spinners at its disposal, something which India hasn’t done since 2012 against England in Nagpur.

One never knows whether it pricked Jasprit Bumrah’s ego somewhat but then, it was his day at the Eden Gardens on Friday. The figures of 14-5-27-5, his 16th fifer in Tests, once again highlights how lucky Indian cricket is to be blessed with a freakish talent like him and the need for him to be cotton-woolled as much as possible for maximum effect.

It was Bumrah and his partner-in-crime Mohammed Siraj who wreaked maxium havoc on the World Test Championship (WTC) winners, while Kuldeep Yadav kept the batters guessing throughout for his two wickets.

Looking at the bigger picture, 'Jassi' now has the highest number of five-wicket hauls among active Indian bowlers as he overtook teammate Ravindra Jadeja’s tally of 15. There are, however, four stalwarts far ahead of them — Ravi Ashwin leading the pack with 37, followed by Anil Kumble (35), Harbhajan Singh (25) and Kapil Dev (23).

It came as a startling revelation that as many as 10 members of this Indian playing eleven, barring senior allrounder Jadeja, were playing their first Test at the historic venue. The last Test India played here was the pink-ball business against Bangladesh in 2019 when the pace attack comprised Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Shami and Umesh Yadav, of whom only Shami remains in the periphery now. The likes of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Ravi Ashwin have quit the longer format in a year of transition.

One doesn’t know whether the so called rotational system of venues is to be blamed for this, but the fact remains that at 31 and after nearly seven years of his international debut, Bumrah — arguably the greatest fast bowler of this generation — got a chance to showcase his talent in whites at this venue.

The chatter around him asking for ‘too many breaks’ had also apparently not gone down well with the champion bowler, who had been playing in all formats after the England tour with Asia Cup T20, two Tests against the visiting West Indies and even the T20I series in Australia.

‘’It feels good whenever you can make an impact for the country,’’ Bumrah said later, refusing to comment on the vexed workload management issue. ‘’The fitness question I will not answer as they are not my questions. I try to contribute as much as I can,’’ he said. 

This morning, Bumrah bowled an unusually long first spell of seven overs — first striking with some late movement against the in-form opener Ryan Rickleton in his sixth over. His second wicket in this spell, however, was chin music at its best when a back-of-the-length delivery reared up viciously to catch Aiden Markram unawares. It touched his glove and flew to Rishabh Pant for the simplest of catches, firing up the smiling assassin.

It was on the back of Bumrah’s brilliance and Kuldeep Yadav’s welcome return to the playing eleven that the hosts could throttle South Africa, whose batting showed spine in similar conditions in Pakistan only last month. They flattered to deceive this morning, after Rickelton and Markram had begun on a positive note and even after losing De Zorzi, were 114/3 at one stage, but lost the remaining seven wickets for 45 runs.

Back to the team selection, a combination of Jadeja, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar and Kuldeep looked more like an outrageous experiment on a first-day wicket which held no terrors despite a bit of variable bounce. It was obvious that one of the spinners would be underbowled and so was Sundar, who was not needed beyond one over and has been drafted as a no. 3 batter also ahead of Sai Sudarshan.

Asked about the baffling selection, Bumrah said: ‘’Sir, I am not the captain anymore and hence cannot comment on it.’’

INDIA’S TOP FIVE-WICKET HAUL BOWLERS

Ravi Ashwin (37)

Anil Kumble (35)

Harbhajan Singh (25)

Kapil Dev (23)

Jasprit Bumrah (16)