Former Indian batter Manoj Tiwary has criticized Jasprit Bumrah’s workload strategy after the five-match Test series against England. Bumrah played three out of the five Test matches against England and picked 14 wickets at an average of 26.

After the Test series, many experts have questioned Bumrah for picking and choosing Test matches. Tiwary said Bumrah should not have been picked by the Ajit Agarkar-led selection if he was not fit to play all five Test matches.

Bumrah had suffered a serious back injury on the Australian tour and since then a special importance has been paid to managing his workload.

Manoj Tiwary told CricTracker, “If a player is not fit for a five-Test series, when you know beforehand, then obviously, you will not pick that individual. Why will you pick that individual? Because no one is bigger than the game of cricket. And it should be told to everyone, irrespective of whether he’s Jasprit Bumrah, whether it is Virat Kohli or Rohit Sharma, or anyone in this world. No one is bigger than the game of cricket.”

“If the team management knows or the selector knows that he’s not going to survive for five Tests on a trot, he should not be picked.”

The former Bengal cricketer said Bumrah should not have been picked in the first place when the selectors knew he was not going to play all five Test matches.

“We would have understood if the backup was not there, the bench strength was not there, then obviously you want to take Jasprit Bumrah because you know there is no other bowlers who are ready to take over international cricket. But when you know you have a bench strength, when you have a pool of fast bowlers who are really doing well, then obviously he should not have been picked in the first place,” said Tiwary (via the aforementioned source).

Bumrah will be seen in action in the upcoming Asia Cup.