Mumbai Indians’ bowling coach Shane Bond heaped praise on Jasprit Bumrah, saying the India fast bowler’s desire to improve makes him one of the best fast bowlers in the world.
The Mumbai Indians (MI) pacer is joint second in the list of wicket-takers in the Indian Premier League, alongside MI teammate Trent Boult, Rajasthan Royals’ Jofra Archer, and Kings XI Punjab’s Mohammed Shami. Delhi Capitals’ Kagiso Rabada leads the pack with 18 wickets.
Bumrah is one of the world’s premier fast bowlers currently, having led the India attack in their first-ever Test series win in Australia in 2018-19.
“It’s been fun, always loved working with Booms (Bumrah), six years now,” said Bond in a video on Mumbai’s pace attack posted by MI on Twitter.
“The thing I love about Jasprit is his willingness to want to improve. He’s turned up in this series, he has got another different ball in his armoury and when you’re seeing it from a player who’s self-motivated, doing things in the background to make himself better, then there’s no surprise to me that he’s one of the best fast bowlers in the world.”
Bumrah had been inconsistent in the early part of the tournament and was unhappy about it but then came back in form against Rajasthan Royals, picking up four wickets for 20. The right-arm pace bowler took the new ball for the first time in this edition in that match on October 6.
Bond also praised MI’s other pace bowlers, Trent Boult and James Pattinson, and attributed his team’s success to the presence of three high-quality fast bowlers.
“From my point of view, I am really happy with the way things are going and the reason for that is that the three guys, the seamers, at the moment are bowling beautifully.
“The bowlers have got a number of different skills. And I encourage them to use those skills. We’ve obviously used the bouncer and the short ball a lot. We’ve got three bowlers who bowl 140 kilometres per hour.”