Jasprit Bumrah Shatters Records, Becomes Fastest Indian to get 200 Test Wickets!

Melbourne (The Uttam Hindu): Indian pacer Jasprit Bumrah, now among the elite fast bowlers in cricket history put Australia on the backfoot during the third innings of the fourth match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. Bumrah struck decisively taking three wickets in two consecutive overs including his 200th Test wicket. The milestone came when Travis Head was caught by Nitish Reddy at short mid-wicket on the second ball of the 34th over. Head managed just 1 run off 3 balls.

Bumrah continued his fiery spell dismissing Mitchell Marsh on the final ball of the same over with a delivery outside off-stump that was caught by wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant. In his next over he bowled out Alex Carey reducing Australia to 102/6 from a promising 80/2 in just seven overs. At the time of reporting, Marnus Labuschagne was holding the fort with 48 runs off 99 balls, accompanied by captain Pat Cummins, who had scored 5 runs off 11 balls.

Bumrah’s performance in this innings was stellar with figures of 4 wickets for 28 runs in 13 overs. His career statistics now stand at 202 wickets at an exceptional average of 19.5 making him the only bowler in the 147-year history of Test cricket to take 200 wickets at an average below 20. This places him ahead of legends like Malcolm Marshall (20.0), Joel Garner (21.0) and Curtly Ambrose (21.0).

Earlier in the day, India resumed their first innings at 358/9 and added just 11 more runs before being all out. Century-maker Nitish Reddy was caught by Mitchell Starc off Nathan Lyon for 114 runs while Mohammad Siraj remained unbeaten on 4. Australia’s second innings started poorly with debutant Sam Constas bowled by Bumrah for 8 runs in the sixth over. Usman Khawaja contributed 21 before being bowled by Siraj while Steve Smith managed 13 before Pant caught him off Siraj’s bowling. The Australian lineup faltered with no other batsman reaching double digits leaving India firmly in control of the match.