"I own the air," was the motto of the Pakistani speedster Shoaib Akhtar. How did Shoaib take so many wickets on dry, lifeless pitches? By taking the fastest route to the stumps.
Jasprit Bumrah owned the air in Melbourne today. The young Indian paceman delivered a masterclass, routing the Australian batting in a style reminiscent of the great subcontinental fast bowlers. After two days of risk-averse cricket from both teams, the Bumrah-led assault was simply a joy to watch.
Watching Bumrah throughout the series, there had been a sense of a dam waiting to burst. With his physics-defying generation of pace, he had always been fascinating to the spectator and a constant threat to the batsmen, but his biggest haul so far had been three wickets. In Perth, he beat the bat more than some bowlers do in a year of Test cricket. His luck would surely turn.
On this day when luck turned, turned and turned again, the salient fact was the ensemble of Indian skill in the field, led by Bumrah. Unlike the Australians in India’s first innings, each of the Indian bowlers aimed at the stumps, forcing the Australian batsmen to play, a revival of direct attacking cricket that overturned the negativity of the first two days.
It was on the stroke of lunch that Bumrah took over. To Shaun Marsh, he bowled five balls of sharp pace, slanting close to the off-stump. The Australian, desperate to let everything go, watched the ball and left it decisively. One remained.
There is something of the Hindu mystic in Bumrah as he stutters in off a few steps, bracelets jiggling, elbows bracketed around the ball, the stiff arms releasing in the manner of a gymnast about to throw a cartwheel. How Bumrah propels the ball so fast off a spin-bowler’s run-up is a matter for study. Having taught himself to bowl growing up in Gujarat, his childhood ruptured by his father’s death from hepatitis, Bumrah was never tamed by a textbook. What worked, worked – particularly in one-day cricket, where he developed two lethal yorkers, one very fast and one hypnotically slow.
In the present series, his third after graduating to Test cricket,
Bumrah had not yet used the slow one. Marsh braced for one last thunderbolt before lunch. In a blur, Bumrah wiped off a quarter of the ball’s pace. As it ballooned in the air, time froze. By the time Marsh came to, he had been struck on the ankle. He shook his head all the way to the changing room and, you suspect, all the way to the psychologist’s couch.
Bumrah’s spell – in the magical sense of the word – was only beginning. He owned the air. With another full delivery, he sliced through Travis Head, and when Jadeja also used the aerial route to deceive Mitchell Marsh, India had whittled Australia down to the tough nuts. Tim Paine and Patrick Cummins staged their customary stand, most of it while Bumrah was resting. Paine was dropped at the wicket and India lost an lbw review; the game felt like it might be turning, when instead it was waiting for more Bumrah. Presently, he came back to rifle through Paine and the tail and claim the big haul he deserved.
This moment had been looming – for Bumrah, for India. They were on the wrong side of the toss and other twists of fortune in Perth. They only needed a nod from luck to assert their superiority in skill. Questions about their desire were answered with a disciplined, dogged grind in their first innings. Now their bowlers had their day.
The pitch did not become any better for cricket; Bumrah and his teammates simply rendered it irrelevant. They didn’t just bowl Australia out; they taught them a lesson. Which Australia’s bowlers, in a helter-skelter final session, showed they were big enough to learn. The wheel of fortune completed its spin by rewarding Cummins and, through the bowlers’ grace, the beleaguered MCG curator. Just desserts all round, and India ended up owning the air. One more good day and they will also own the turf.
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricke...-isn-t-everything-at-mcg-20181228-p50oom.html
