Why is Jasprit Bumrah in trouble for IPL 2026? Mumbai Indians head coach explains

Mumbai Indians head coach Mahela Jayawardene has explained why Jasprit Bumrah is struggling in IPL 2026. Bumrah has not been at his best in the ongoing season, managing just four wickets in 13 matches. With their leading pace, Mumbai Indians have failed to hit their best form and endured a tough campaign and have already been knocked out of the tournament.

The five-time champions will be playing for pride when they take on Rajasthan Royals at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on May 22. Jayawardene said Bumrah entered the IPL with a slight twitch from the T20 World Cup and needed time to regain his rhythm after returning from injury.

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“Yes, I think it’s a combination of things. Also coming back from the World Cup, he had a bit of a bug that he played through the tournament with, so we gave him adequate rest when he came back. The first four or five games were a gradual build-up to get him fully recovered and you could see the pace dropped a bit because of that,” Jayawardene said at the pre-match press conference.

“Now he’s back to his full pace. He’s been good in the last four or five games. But when you go through something like that, you lose a bit of sharpness in execution because you’re managing something else alongside it,” Jayawardene said.

MINIMUM RISK AGAINST BUMRAH

Interestingly, even though Bumrah hasn’t taken many wickets, he still has the best economy rate among Mumbai bowlers with an economy of 8.36. Jayawardene added that the opposition batsmen were not overly aggressive against him and the MI bowlers from the other end also struggled to build consistent pressure.

“He’s 100 percent healthy. Unfortunately for us, the season is over. I also think teams didn’t take too many chances against him in certain situations, played him because we couldn’t create enough pressure around him. Pitchers weren’t able to create the pressure we needed, so tactically teams approached him differently.”

“So I can’t say there is only one reason. It was a combination of factors but I wouldn’t worry about Booms. He is in good spirits and will come back strong,” Jayawardene added.

Mumbai Indians are currently ninth in the table with eight points and a net rate of -0.510, having won four of their 13 matches.

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Issued by:

sabyasachi chowdhury

Published on:

23 May 2026 17:30 IST

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