Jasprit Bumrah defended his seam bowling colleague Umesh Yadav after coming under fire for an expensive final over vs Australia. (Source: PTI)Jasprit Bumrah has defended his colleague Umesh Yadav after the latter came under fire for his expensive last over in the first T20I against India in Vizag. In the opening T20I on Sunday, Umesh Yadav was unable to defend 14 runs, as Australia clinched the contest on the last ball with 3 wickets to spare.
In the penultimate over, with Australia chasing 127 runs, Bumrah got India back into the match with a superb over where he gave away only two runs while picking up two wickets as well.
Asked about Yadav’s last over, Bumrah defended his senior colleague. “This happens, death bowling is always difficult in any situation. It always goes both ways and it’s sometimes 50-50,” Bumrah said at the post-match news conference. “You try your best, and you’re clear in your execution. Some days it works, some days it doesn’t. Nothing to be worried. We wanted to close the game in our favour but it’s okay,” Bumrah, who took 3 for 16 in four overs with 18 dot balls, said.
“It’s a little different once you know your target. It was a small target, so once you hit one boundary then you don’t need to take a lot of risks. At first, we are still figuring out what is the safe total so I think that was a difference maybe. They were were rotating the strikes after hitting a boundary.”
Bumrah, like his skipper Virat Kohli, said around 140-145 would have been a par score on this wicket.
“We almost pulled off this game. But on this wicket, around 140-145 would have been a very good score. There was low bounce and it was difficult to hit big shots. It’s always difficult to chase on these kind of wickets,” he said.
“We were short by 15-20 runs, but we had a fighting total. Everybody could have taken a little more responsibility but this happens in the game of cricket. We lost two-three wickets more than we wanted to, but we backed our team and wanted to execute whatever we had.”
Bumrah believed that it wasn’t an easy wicket to bat on. “I was just focusing on what my strengths are what the wicket was because the wicket was a little difficult to bat on. It’s not easy to score heavily on this wicket,” Bumrah, who returned to action after a being rested following the Test series in Australia, said.
With India losing wickets quickly in the middle, MS Dhoni held fort but refused to take singles to guard Yuzvendra Chahal in the last two overs. “We were just trying our best. He was just trying to take the game deep and trying to get us to a safe total which he tried. I think he gave us a total something we could fight for.”
Opener KL Rahul hit a fifty on his comeback and he said it would increase the competition for the opener’s slot which is good.
“It’s always good when you got competition in the team. He (Rahul) looked the best batsman. He was playing with a lot of composure. He started off playing good shots and he was paying conventional shots. So it’s very good when a player like him is back in form.”
