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Follow UsPetition to request ICC to strip India of the title in case they end up winning this T20 World Cup, because they’ve been blatantly cheating.
Cheating by deploying one Jasprit Bumrah, and thereby giving their opponents just 16 overs to score runs off, as opposed to the 20 they get themselves.
Yeah, so that was a pretty bad ‘joke’, but you get the point: Jasprit Bumrah is a cheat code.
India are in the final of yet another ICC event, and Bumrah has somehow managed to outdo himself. He’s somehow managed to statistically better what he did in the 2023 ODI World Cup, which in itself was right up there as the greatest WC campaign by a bowler ever.
Seven games into India’s campaign, Bumrah’s numbers read as follows:
154 balls bowled, 13 wickets taken at an average of 8.15 and an economy of 4.12.
He’s bowled 96 dot balls, meaning 62.33% of his balls have been dots. And he’s conceded just 10 boundaries in total, which equates to a boundary conceded every 15.4 balls, which in turn means he’s conceded less than two boundaries per match on average.
By the way, just to make sure everyone's dialed in, this is T20 cricket we’re talking about.
These are numbers too good to be true, so it’s only fair that they’ve been produced by a cricketer that’s too good to be true: a ‘do-it-all’ monster who is not only the most complete bowler the game has ever seen, but also the bowler with arguably the greatest peak this game has ever witnessed.
In its 17-year history, never has the T20 World Cup witnessed a bowling campaign like Bumrah’s 2024.
We’ll get to the ‘why’ part by starting off with his economy.
Since T20WC’s inception, there have been 160 instances of bowlers bowling 20+ overs in a single campaign.
In that, Bumrah’s economy of 4.1 in 2024 is, by some distance, the best, with Sunil Narine’s 2014 being the only other 20+ over campaign to see a bowler register an economy under 5.00.
Now, let’s address the elephant in the room straight away. Yes, Bumrah’s absurd 2024 is partly a byproduct of the surfaces that have been on offer.
The overall run rate in the 2024 T20WC (7.06) is the lowest in an edition of the competition, and the slow and low nature of the wickets — especially in the US — have aided Bumrah’s cause.
But, make no mistake, even taking that into account, Bumrah’s 2024 stands tall as the best.
The difference between his economy and the overall tournament economy is the best in an edition of the competition.
He’s registered such ludicrous numbers while doing something pretty much none of the others in the two lists above did, which was bowl as much as he has in the toughest phase to bowl in T20 cricket, the death overs (16-20).
Bumrah’s economy in T20WC 2024 reads 4.1 despite the right-armer bowling nearly 40% of his overs in the 16-20 phase.
In fact, T20WC 2024 has seen Bumrah register an economy under 5.00 in all three phases — 3.8 in the powerplay (1-6), 4.0 in middle-overs (7-15) and 4.8 at the death (16-20).
It’s the first time in T20WC history a bowler has registered an economy under 5.0 in all three phases of the game, bowling at least three overs in each phase.
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Historically, in T20WCs, few — if any — have been able to be outstanding defensively while at the same time being a serious wicket-taking threat.
Narine, in 2014, had an E.R. of 4.6 but only took six wickets. Badree, in 2016, also took only nine wickets, despite registering a stunning economy of 5.4.
With one game to go, Bumrah already has 13 wickets to his name. And his 13 wickets have come at an average of 8.2, which is the best for any bowler in an edition of the T20WC.
Bumrah, in this T20WC, has been so threatening that he’s drawn a false shot every two balls. He’s drawn a false shot percentage of 51.90% in this T20WC — meaning batters have played a false stroke to 51.90% of the balls he’s bowled — making it the most threatening campaign in history in terms of underlying metrics, too.
So batters, while facing Bumrah in this T20WC, have either played and missed or have consciously gone into a defensive mode in order to negate this threat. That has resulted in nearly 63% of the 30-year-old’s deliveries being dots, the highest for a bowler in a single campaign in T20WCs.
But as you can see from the second column, this particular statistic has clearly been a byproduct of the surfaces that have been on offer this T20WC.
Statistically, then, Bumrah’s 2024 is, without question, the greatest campaign in T20WC history.
But great campaigns in tournaments are defined by moments as much as numbers.
What arguably makes Bumrah’s 2024 the greatest campaign of all time — regardless of what happens in the final — is that game after game, he’s won every moment that has mattered.
In every important game India have played in this T20WC, there’s been a Bumrah moment that’s defined and shaped the fate of the contest.
Against Pakistan, it was the Mohammad Rizwan dismissal.
Against Afghanistan, it was the wicket of the nucleus of the Afghan’s batting, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, in the very second over of the chase.
He helped India seal the Australia clash with the wicket of Travis Head, and then, in the semi-final, sent England’s best batter in the tournament, Phil Salt, packing with an absolute pearler of an off-cutter.
That’s four big games, and in every big game, Bumrah has dismissed the opposition side’s most important batter.
There has arguably never been a more ‘I’m him’ campaign by any individual in any World Cup (50 or T20) in the history of this sport.
It would truly be a travesty if Bumrah ends up leaving the Caribbean empty-handed after all he’s done. Rohit & Co, the ball is in your court. Again.
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