Why Jasprit Bumrah not playing today: Why is Arshdeep Singh not playing today’s 1st T20I between India and Australia in Mohali?

Why is Jasprit Bumrah not playing today: India have made surprising changes in their fast-bowling department.

During the first T20I of Australia’s tour of India 2022 in Mohali, Australia captain Aaron Finch has won the toss and chose to bowl in his first international match post ODI retirement.

“We’re going to have a bowl first. It is about building up to the [ICC T20] World Cup [in Australia] and about getting some information about our boys. Really excited. The pitch looks hard and flat,” Finch told Star Sports at the toss before revealing that he is hoping for some dew in the second innings.

As predicted by vice-captain Pat Cummins before this match, Finch confirmed a new opening role for all-rounder Cameron Green. Playing only his second T20I, it is noteworthy that Green has never opened the batting in any format of representative cricket.

For the unversed, Australia will be taking the field at the Punjab Cricket Association IS Bindra Stadium in the absence of first-choice players namely David Warner, Mitchell Marsh, Marcus Stoinis and Mitchell Starc due to injury and workload-related reasons.

Why is Jasprit Bumrah not playing vs Australia today?

India captain Rohit Sharma once again laid emphasis on making the most of these opportunities before ICC T20 World Cup. Looking to make amends with respect to Asia Cup 2022 debacle, Sharma hoped for India to click as a unit before traveling down under next month.

“This series will be no different for us to express ourselves. Looking at what happened in the Asia Cup, we had a chance to reflect on where we went wrong. This gives us an opportunity to correct ourselves as a group,” Sharma told Star Sports at the toss.

India, who have preferred veteran wicket-keeper batter Dinesh Karthik over Rishabh Pant, have made surprising changes in the fast-bowling department. While pacer Jasprit Bumrah needs some more time to recover from a back injury before playing a match, another pacer in Arshdeep Singh is not part of the squad as he’s at the National Cricket Academy for conditioning purpose.

“[Jasprit] Bumrah is not playing. He will take a game’s break and probably come back in the second and the third game,” Sharma added.

Instead of giving World Cup standby pacer Deepak Chahar an opportunity, India have handed a shocking comeback to Umesh Yadav. With the last of his seven T20Is (excluding this match) also coming against Australia at home, Yadav is playing a T20I after more than three and a half years. Had it not been for pacer Mohammed Shami testing positive for COVID-19, Yadav wouldn’t be playing this match.