Muttiah Muralitharan makes big comment amid MI star’s struggles

Sunrisers Hyderabad spin-bowling coach Muttiah Muralitharan has given his assessment on the poor form of ace fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah in IPL 2026.

It is no secret that Mumbai Indians’ Bumrah has struggled in IPL 2026. His struggle increased further in MI’s match against SRH on 29 April. The Bumrah-led Mumbai bowling attack failed to defend the target of 244 runs and suffered their sixth defeat of IPL 2026.

Particularly, Bumrah was not in form. He gave 54 runs in his four overs without taking any wicket. All the SRH batsmen took turns to deposit Bumrah in the stands. Abhishek Sharma, Travid Head, Heinrich Klaasen and Salil Arora all contributed with the dismissal of Jasprit Bumrah to give SRH their fourth consecutive win.

“It is difficult for bowlers these days” – Muralitharan

Muralitharan spoke to reporters after SRH’s win over MI at the Wankhede Stadium. He was asked why these days it is becoming more difficult for bowlers to survive in the league.

He said, “It is very difficult for the bowlers these days, because in every team, not only ours, there are openers who do not care about getting out. They just go after the bowling. When we were playing, getting 40-50 runs and losing 1 wicket was a good score, now the average score in the first 6 overs is between 70 and 80. So, these days the scores are going beyond 200.”

“Batsmen don’t respect even a player like Jasprit Bumrah” – Muralitharan

The Sri Lankan also reflected on SRH’s decision to chase the target and the performance of its batsmen.

“We knew from this wicket [that] It was a very good wicket because they played the T20 World Cup at the same venue and RCB played against Mumbai and it was high scoring. We thought it would be easy to chase the target because our batsmen are in form because the top order is scoring a lot of runs and they are getting them quickly.

He said, “Even batsmen don’t respect bowlers of Jasprit Bumrah’s caliber or anyone else.” [them]. they go after bowling [from] On the very first ball, they achieve their target,” the legend concluded.

Jasprit Bumrah’s poor form in IPL 2026

Bumrah has basically been a statistical anomaly in IPL 2026. His usual aggressive nature has not been seen at all in the tournament.

He has bowled 30 overs in 8 matches and taken only two wickets. His bowling average of 132 is one of the worst by any bowler in an IPL season.

Jasprit Bumrah, generally known as a consistent match-winner, has had to struggle this year. These conflicts have further increased the problems of Mumbai Indians.

Also read: IPL 2026: Mumbai Indians coach admits that this season has been bad for Jasprit Bumrah

next match of mumbai indians

Mumbai Indians’ next match will be against arch-rivals Chennai Super Kings. They have already lost once to CSK and are currently placed ninth in the IPL 2025 points table with just 2 wins from 8 matches.

That game will be played in Chennai on May 2 and a defeat could end Mumbai’s qualification chances.