"He was desperate to play Test cricket with Virat Kohli" - Ravi Shastri recalls unleashing Jasprit Bumrah in the red-ball format for Team India
Former Team India all-rounder and head coach Ravi Shastri spoke about Jasprit Bumrah's desperation to play Test cricket and leave a mark in the format after breaking through the circuit as a 'white-ball specialist'. The right-arm pacer is now No. 1 in ICC's rankings for bowlers in Tests, and is Team India's spearhead, whether it be home or away conditions.
Bumrah, with his variations and his innate ability to bowl yorkers, was the ideal candidate for limited-overs cricket. In his initial years with Team India, he only played ODIs and T20Is, while also representing the Mumbai Indians (MI) in the Indian Premier League (IPL).
His big break in the red-ball format came through Shastri and then-captain Virat Kohli's shared vision of creating a pace battery to succeed in overseas conditions.
"I remember my first call to him, it was in Kolkata. I asked him would he be interested in Test cricket. He said that would be the biggest day of his life. He was labeled as a white-ball cricketer without asking him. But I knew. I wanted to see how hungry he was. I told him to get ready, be prepared. I told him I was going to unleash him in South Africa," Shastri said in an interview with former England skipper Michael Atherton for The Times.
"He was desperate to play Test cricket with Virat Kohli. They know, at the end of the day, no one remembers white ball averages. They will always remember your numbers in Test cricket," he added
Bumrah ended up making his debut in the first Test of the 2018 tour of South Africa in Cape Town. He picked up four wickets in his first appearance and secured a five-wicket haul in the historic win at The Wanderers as well.
Since then, he has been a constant presence in the seam-bowling unit for the Men in Blue and has played a huge role in several of the team's famous overseas wins such as in Melbourne, Nottingham, and Cape Town.
"You were allowed to bounce the s**t out of anyone" - Ravi Shastri on the fast bowling revolution during his tenure as Team India head coach
Team India forged a serious pace bowling unit, with the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, and Mohammed Siraj also coming into the picture later on.
The pace unit was responsible for the team's rise in red-ball cricket, especially overseas, and as mentioned before, Shastri and Kohli's shared vision played a huge role.
Shastri recalled the no-holds-barred policy the team had signed off for pacers during the net session.
"We were on the same page and wanted a battery of fast bowlers. He was ready for a scrap. He wanted to play hard. We made it a free-for-all in the nets. You were allowed to bounce the s**t out of anyone. He was the first guy to embrace it; he was quite prepared to look ugly in the nets and the mindset changed," Shastri said.
The Shastri-Kohli dynamic saw a dominant period for Indian cricket, despite the well-documented lack of ICC silverware. They laid down the foundation well, off which the Men in Blue are still yielding considerable success, while also ensuring that the transition phase will be as smooth as possible.
Shastri reserved praise for the former skipper, labeling him as an 'uncut diamond' when he initially took over the team.
"There was a lot of individual brilliance but I wanted to see team brilliance. I wanted to win and to make Test cricket paramount and identified an uncut diamond in Virat Kohli. While (MS) Dhoni was my captain, my eye was on him (Kohli). I told him very early in my second month: ‘It’ll take time but watch, observe, be ready (for the captaincy),’" he added.
Under Virat Kohli's captaincy, Team India managed to win a Test series in Australia among other notable overseas Test wins, make it to the semi-finals of every ICC tournament barring the 2021 T20 World Cup, and maintain their prowess in the bilateral series as well as home Tests.