Former Indian cricket team all-rounder Irfan Pathan criticised Jasprit Bumrah for his ‘pick and choose’ approach in the recently-concluded Test series against England. The BCCI made it clear ahead of the Test series that Bumrah will not play all the five matches. The pacer ended up playing three games and despite India trailing 1-2 with one match to go, he was rested to manage his workload. Pathan pointed out that Bumrah was holding back on certain occassions and cited the example of the Lord’s Test where he could have bowled for a longer period of time against Joe Root.
There were moments, like when a sixth over was needed. I spoke about this during commentary as well. Joe Root had been dismissed by him 11 times, and in that Lord’s Test, Bumrah bowled five overs. Just one more over, the sixth, could have pushed harder. I felt he held back a little there. There was also some pick-and-choose, which I’ve always been against, and that was visible too,” Pathan said on YouTube.
Pathan went on to say that although Bumrah did perform well on occasions, he did not live up to the expectations that the team had.
