For an Indian bowler, one way to stake a claim for an all-time great is to perform well and create memories, against Pakistan. Jasprit Bumrah, already one of the greatest Indian fast bowlers, today staked his claim to being hailed as arguably the GOAT Indian pacer.
He bowled two sensational balls that have taken him years of hard work to achieve mastery, sending the 130,000-capacity crowd at the Narendra Modi Stadium into a frenzy and breaking open the Pakistani middle order.
First, he deceived the well-set Mohammad Rizwan with an incredible slower ball off-cutter, something on which he’s undoubtedly the best in the world, going through Rizwan’s gate and disturbing the timber.
Then, he bowled what many are calling the ‘Ball of the World Cup 2023’ to dismiss Shadab Khan. This time, he didn’t mess the stumps, but the ball just, ever so precisely, clipped off the off-stump bail, leaving Shadab Khan in disbelief.
It was his stock ball from Jasprit Bumrah – well, which isn’t for him nowadays. A good or hard length ball angling into the stumps. Shadab did nothing wrong in his defensive push. But the ball didn’t come in enough as he expected, beat his outside, and just toppled the off-stump bail out of its position.
‘Hit the top of off-stump’ is what coaches always tell fast bowlers. There is perhaps no better ball than this to epitomize it.
Watch: Jasprit Bumrah bowls the ‘Ball of the World Cup 2023’ to Shadab Khan
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Meanwhile, Pakistan are on the brink of getting bowled out and under the threat of not being able to play out their 50 overs after Rohit Sharma inserted them in to bat first. At the time of writing, they are 189/9 in the 41st over.
Teams:
India (Playing XI): Rohit Sharma(c), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul(w), Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj
Pakistan (Playing XI): Abdullah Shafique, Imam-ul-Haq, Babar Azam(c), Mohammad Rizwan(w), Saud Shakeel, Iftikhar Ahmed, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Nawaz, Hasan Ali, Shaheen Afridi, Haris Rauf
