The return of Bhuvneshwar Kumar — ‘At some stage you need experience’

Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Image: IPL

Beyond Jasprit Bumrah, India’s pace attack in white-ball cricket doesn’t inspire confidence. Prasidh Krishna made his international debut in 2021, six years after cutting his teeth in first-class cricket. But even after so many years, he has failed to come of age. The Karnataka seamer is not in the T20I scheme of things at the moment.

Arshdeep Singh has played 95 T20Is, taking 141 wickets. On the face of it, this is impressive. But the left-arm quick hasn’t grown into the role of leader of the pace pack.

The likes of Gurnoor Brar, Mayank Yadav, Prince Yadav and Yash Thakur are spring chickens and fall into the emerging fast bowlers category.

It’s a different ball game when Bumrah is bowling from one end and when he isn’t playing. The England tour in the summer laid bare the tattered fabric of India’s back-up seam bowling in Bumrah’s absence. Going ahead, the great man is unlikely to feature much in bilateral T20Is, with an eye on the World Test Championship (WTC) and the 2027 World Cup.

This prompted the selectors to bring Bhuvneshwar Kumar back into the Indian team fold for the upcoming tour of New Zealand after a gap of four years. India’s pace attack is desperately calling for experience, and the 36-year-old can still make the new ball talk, going by his exploits in the 2026 IPL. The selection committee, with Pragyan Ojha as its interim head, and the team management were in sync in bringing Bhuvneshwar back into the Indian team set-up in the shortest format.

Ahead of the second T20I against the West Indies in Ranchi on Friday, Sitanshu Kotak, India’s batting coach, spoke about Bhuvneshwar’s return, in a way admitting that the bowling travails in England during the five-match T20I series in July had been an eye-opener.

“One thing obviously is it’s the selectors’ choice,” Kotak said at the pre-match press conference on the eve of the match. “But still I can give you an answer about what I think… In England, I also personally felt with Bumrah not being around and all the new bowlers, the young bowlers were playing, and we all know that you can’t beat experience. They are also good but at some stage you need experience. So I’m just thinking that might be one reason.”

Ravi Shastri, when he was the India head coach, used to maintain: “You can’t buy experience in a super market.” Add Bhuvneshwar’s skill set and intelligence to this, and India have quality in their ranks. Bhuvneshwar rolling back the years in international cricket in New Zealand would be one heck of a comeback story.

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