IPL 2017: Lasith Malinga taught me to bowl outswingers, says Jasprit Bumrah

With his impressive performance for India from day one of his inclusion to the team, Jasprit Bumrah has earned a permanent spot in the limited-overs team. While Bumrah has a natural pace, the Mumbai Indians (MI) cricketer recently admitted that his Indian Premier League (IPL) teammate Lasith Malinga has contributed a lot towards the improvement of his bowling. Talking specifically about his bowling style, Bumrah revealed that he did not know how to bowl outswingers and it was Malinga who taught him the procedure. He also mentioned about talking to Malinga off-IPL for advises to improve his bowling. FULL CRICKET SCORECARD: Mumbai Indians vs Royal Challengers Bangalore, Match 38 at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai

In an interview with Times of India, Bumrah was quoted saying, “Earlier, I didn’t knew how to bowl an outswinger. He taught me how to do it. He gave me the confidence that even though I’ve a different action, that doesn’t mean it won’t work. `It will work and have confidence in that,’ he told me. Even when I’m not playing the IPL, I still talk to him about what kind of things I should do to improve myself.”

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Bumrah marked himself as an aggressive young bowler whose anger was calmed by the Sri Lankan pacer.

“When I started playing cricket, I used to get angry , aggressive, I used to do stupid things in front of the batsman. I could go and say anything. But as I played more cricket with him, I realised that the more calmer you’re the better you’re, because at that time your brain starts to work and you come to know what things you’ve to do. Malinga told me not to get very angry. You’ve to keep a calm head and focus ahead.”

Bumrah also does not believe in sledging but focusing on the bowling more, which also is something he learnt from Malinga.

“If I start to do that, I think I lose control. I don’t want to drift away from the situation. I want to focus on the things which I have to do. I’m aggressive, I always look to contain the batsmen, but I don’t sledge. I’ve learnt that from Malinga,” he summed up.