‘He Is A Good Leader’: Suresh Raina Backs Jasprit Bumrah To Lead The Side In Rohit Sharma's Absence In Perth Test

Former India player Suresh Raina feels that Jasprit Bumrah has the potential to lead the Indian team in the upcoming Border-Gavaskar Trophy series starting on November 22. As per reports, India’s skipper Rohit Sharma is likely to miss the first Test due to family commitments and as a result, Jasprit Bumrah can be the perfect replacement to lead the Indian team. The Indian team will take part in the upcoming Border-Gavaskar Trophy after sustaining a loss in the recently passed Test series against New Zealand. 

While talking to Times of India, Suresh Raina said, "For Bumrah, it's going to be a new opportunity. I think he is a good leader and has a good cricketing brain. Even Gauti bhai (coach Gautam Gambhir) said in the media that Jasprit has astute leadership (quality), and I think he will be different. Like if you see Pat Cummins, he won the World Cup for them (Australia), has done really well as a player and as a captain”.

"I think Bumrah is close to that. If you look at it from the point of an opportunity, it's a gun opportunity for him. If he does well, I think we will have a future leader in Test cricket," Raina added.

Earlier, Jasprit Bumrah had led the Indian team two times, his first stint was in the 2022 tour of England and his second instance transpired in August 2023, when he led a young Indian team to a T20I series win against Ireland.

India’s Squad for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy: Rohit Sharma (C), Jasprit Bumrah (VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Rishabh Pant (WK), Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel (WK), R. Ashwin, R. Jadeja, Mohammed Siraj, Akash Deep, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar.

Reserves: Mukesh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, Khaleel Ahmed.