Jasprit Bumrah shares growth as Mumbai Indians player

Jasprit Bumrah didn’t have much experience when Mumbai Indians signed him for IPL 2013. He made his debut against Royal Challengers Bangalore (now Bengaluru) on April 4 and conceded three back-to-back boundaries against Virat Kohli in his first over. However, the ace pacer made a strong comeback, picking up the wicket of the star India batter in the fourth ball, which marked the start of an incredible career.

Speaking about his early days as Mumbai Indians player, Bumrah revealed that he used to depend a lot on captain Rohit Sharma and used to ask him to set the field on his behalf. The 30-year-old stated that with time he understood the tasks and started changing fields as he didn’t want to depend on others.

“When I came into cricket, I didn’t know a lot – when I started playing IPL – I used to go & tell Rohit Sharma, ‘you set the field, I don’t know. I am going to bowl this ball, you set the field & I trust you, whatever the field right you set the field’ – then slowly I realised I can’t be overly dependent on others then I started learning the craft,” Bumrah told Indian Express.

I am a fan of Ibrahimovic, his story resonated with me: Bumrah

Jasprit Bumrah revealed that he was a huge fan of Swedish footballer Zlatan Ibrahimovic and hoped to meet him one day. The Ahmedabad-born cricketer mentioned that his story resonated with him as both players come from a family that didn’t have much knowledge about the sport and that they both fought against all the odds to make it big.

“I am a fan of Ibrahimovic, his story resonated with me – I came from a family where nobody played the sport, nobody knew anything about the sport – I used to ball differently and many didn’t have the believe, what is this bowling, this won’t last – so fighting against the odds, I have seen in his story – hopefully one day I will get an opportunity to meet him,” Bumrah said.