If he has another injury in the same spot, that could be a career-ender: Shane Bond on Jasprit Bumrah

Jasprit Bumrah has been out of the cricketing scene for a couple of months now. After a superlative performance in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024-25, he was ruled out for the next few weeks after sustaining a back injury on the second day of the final Test. He has been out since early January. 

Former New Zealand speedster, Shane Bond, shared that he had predicted Bumrah not being able to make the India squad for the Champions Trophy 2025. He emphasised that the quick switchover between the conclusion of the upcoming Indian Premier League and the five-match Test series against England could be a period of vulnerability for Bumrah. 

"When he went off for scans, it was at Sydney, there was some messaging coming up around that he had sprains and stuff like that. I worried that it wasn't going to be a sprain, it might be a bony injury around that area [the back]. I thought he may struggle to make the Champions Trophy if it was. Look, I think Booms will be fine, but it's just that [workload] management [matters]. Looking at the tours and the schedule going forward, where are the opportunities to give him a break, but really where are the danger periods? And often, it is that the [transition from] IPL to the Test championship will be a risk," shared Bond, as quoted by ESPNcricinfo.

That's a big jump when you transition out of that: Bond

Bond further elaborated on the intricacies in shifting focus from a preparatory perspective from a 50-over game to a Test match as compared to from T20Is to the longest format of the game. India will travel to England to play the red-ball series across June and early August. 

"Anywhere you transition from particularly T20 to a Test match, it's challenging. If you are playing a one-day series, it's generally not too bad. You will play three games a week, you will have a practice, you are sort of in around that 40 overs [range], that's pretty close to a Test match week anyway. But in T20, particularly in the IPL, when you might be playing three games in a week, there's two days of travel, you might get one training [session], you are sort of bowling 20 overs maybe if you're lucky. That's sort of half of a Test match load or even under a half of, which then is a big jump and you are not bowling back-to-back days. That's a big jump when you transition out of that," he added. 

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Bond, who has been a bowling coach of Mumbai Indians for several years, noted that open dialogue and workload management was what was the pressing requirement for a player like Bumrah.

"So it's going to take some good management and just some open conversations with the player and say, 'look, we are doing this with your best interest in your career'. Any player who's gone through that, and having myself [gone through it], you are desperate to play, but you also understand there are some risks at certain times and you have to make some compromises.

"If we can get him through the English summer and he's fit, we can probably then go with some confidence that we can carry him across the rest of the formats. So that's hard because he is your best bowler, but If he has another injury in the same spot, that could be a career-ender, potentially, because I'm not sure you can have surgery on that spot again," he reasoned.

There are reports that Bumrah might miss the first couple of weeks of IPL 2025. Mumbai Indians will be hoping to have their pace-bowling spearhead back at the earliest.