‘Jasprit Bumrah is Don Bradman of bowling. Australians afraid and intimidated by him’: Adam Gilchrist

It is difficult to find Jasprit Bumrah in the Purple Cap race as almost every team decides to play him off, but the impact he leaves on a T20 game in his four overs is immense. Bumrah has bowled 69 balls in the seven matches that he has played in IPL 2025, averaging nearly 10 dot balls per match, which is higher than any bowler with an economy under 8. Khaleel Ahmed and Josh Hazlewood are the only bowlers with a better dot ball percentage than Bumrah this year, but they have conceded more than 8 runs per over in every match, while Bumrah's economy rate is at a staggering 6.96.

Since Bumrah's availability this year - he missed the first four matches due to a back injury - MI have won six out of seven matches to leapfrog everyone to the top of the points table. In the first two matches, Bumrah was not at his best. He went wicketless for 29 runs against RCB and was hit for 44 by DC but since then, he has turned it around. In the last two matches against LSG and RR, Bumrah picked up six wickets for just 37 runs in his 8 overs.

Considering all this and his overall impact in every format of the game, Australia's great Adam Gilchrist called Bumrah the bowling equivalent of the legendary Don Bradman.

"He's maybe the best bowler, fast bowler of all time. When you start stacking up the statistics and the varying conditions that he has to go out and execute those skills in, I guess you look at Sir Donald Bradman's numbers compared to his peers and he's just so far ahead, so I think Bumrah is sort of in that category across all the different variations that you get in conditions and pitches that you've got to bowl on. He's significantly further ahead than the peers around him, so that tells you we are truly watching greatness," Gilchrist said on Cricbuzz.

Bradman is the only cricketer to retire with a Test average of nearly 100. So stark is Bradman's difference with others that no other batter with more than 10 Tests averages greater than 65. Gillchrist said Bumrah is fast developing such a gap with his peers in all formats.

'Australians never been afraid or intimidated by an Indian bowler like they are by Bumrah': Gilchrist

Bumrah was a thorn in Australia's flesh during the Border-Gavaskar Trophy earlier this year. India lost the series 1-3 but Bumrah's brilliance with the ball always kept the Aussies on their toes.

"A seamer from India, consistently throughout, particularly the series that we just saw in the summer, back home in the Australian summer, no, I don't think so," Gilchrist said when he was asked whether Australians were intimidated and afraid of a bowler from India like they were against Jasprit Bumrah.

Bumrah returned as the highest wicket-taker of the five-match series, picking up 32 wickets at an average of 13. "We just sat and watched in awe at close range commentating on that series and again, I know it's a different format, but he is the best all-format bowler; that's nothing to argue there," the former wicketkeeper-batter said.

Former India spinner called Bumrah a national treasure because of the way he adjusts his length according to the conditions quicker than others.

"He's a national treasure, I think at the moment for us a lot, whoever follows cricket and wants India to do well, during the BGT, I think all of us were wishing that he could bowl from both ends. India looked a different side and he looked a different bowler against Australia, he is, look, one of the things which I felt with Bumrah over the period of time is that he acclimatises to any pitch very quickly and I think many bowlers have a certain length that they bowl, but he doesn't have a certain length, he bowls the length which is required on that surface and that's his greatness, the oddity of his action, obviously everybody talks about, but coupled with the skills that he has and a great brain, when to use it," Kartik said.