It was a dream return for Jasprit Bumrah at Newlands, Cape Town, the venue where he made his Test debut in 2018, as the 28-year-old registered his seventh five-wicket haul in the longer format of the game.
Riding on Bumrah’s efforts, India bundled out South Africa for 210 in their first innings on Day 2 of the ongoing Test in Cape Town and took a slender lead of 13 runs.
Spearheading the Indian attack, Bumrah provided India with crucial breakthroughs, which included the prized wickets of Proteas captain Dean Elgar and Keegan Petersen, who scored 72 runs and emerged as the top-run scorer from the South African camp.
Bumrah had come into the Test after a quiet outing in Johannesburg, following which his performance came under a lot of scrutiny. The 28-year-old, however, stated that his clinical performance on Wednesday was not motivated by previous failure but it was just focusing at the present, which helped him yield results.
“Nothing out of ordinary and I wasn’t giving extra attention. I was not really too angry and I was focused on the present and did what I had to,” Bumrah, who took five for 42 in the third Test, said at the end of day’s play.
The premier India seamer added that noise from outside hardly matters as somedays it is him picking the wickets and on others someone else steps up to the task.
“Some days I would get wickets, some days somebody else will get wickets,” he added.
Explaining further how he reacts to opinions being formed, Bumrah said he doesn’t pay attention, adding there will always be doubters as well as the well-wishers.
“There will be doubters and there will be people praising you and that is something that an individual has to decide. I don’t really pay attention to outside noise as it doesn’t really help.”
“When I bowl, I have it in my control and I try to bring in my perspective towards bowling, try to avoid what’s going on, may be some people might like my bowling and some people might not,” said Bumrah.
