Dinesh Karthik, a former wicketkeeper-batsman for India, talked about the possibility of Jasprit Bumrah taking over as captain of the Indian national cricket team. For some time now, people have been talking about giving Bumrah the captaincy after Rohit Sharma retired from T20s following India’s successful T20 World Cup campaign. Nevertheless, T20I captaincy was eventually given to Suryakumar Yadav who is also his teammate at Mumbai Indians.
Speaking on Cricbuzz, one fan wanted to know what Karthik thought about Bumrah becoming India’s captain someday? One thing he mentioned was how essential it is to have him fit for such significant matches and an added responsibility of leading a side could increase the risk of injury for the spearhead bowler.
“However, his calmness and most importantly good maturity… but still he is a fast bowler so how do you play him in all three formats? That could have been THE question any selector would have asked,” clarified Karthik when explaining why it was difficult to manage workloads across all formats for Bumrah.
Furthermore, Dinesh Karthik stated that one needs to treat Bumrah like a Kohinoor diamond because he was an “asset” that required proper management.
“As a fast bowler especially at that level where it’s important to protect him and play him in big games.I keep saying this about Bumrah, he is like a Kohinoor diamond – we have to protect him, take care of him, and ensure that he lasts as long as possible. Because whenever Bumrah plays, in any format, he makes an impact. That’s what we want. To burden him with captaincy and then see him end up playing a lot of series and injuring himself would be a huge problem,” Karthik added.
Bumrah has captained India before. He led the team in a one-off Test against England at Edgbaston in 2022 and also, he was in charge when they won all three T20 matches played against Ireland.
Nevertheless, Dinesh Karthik’s remarks indicate how much Bumrah’s workload needs to be managed properly if his international career is to be extended and maximised.
