Champions Trophy 2025: Bumrah's absence will reduce India's winning chances 'literally by 30-35 per cent', says Shastri

The Champions Trophy returns to action in exactly two weeks’ time with the opening game between hosts and defending champions Pakistan and New Zealand taking place on 19 February in Karachi . But before two-time champions India can turn their attention to winning a second ICC event in as many years, they will have to face England in a three-match One-Day International series that gets underway in Nagpur on Thursday.

Though India were a dominant side in the T20I series under Suryakumar Yadav’s captaincy, winning the five-match rubber 4-1 including a couple of them by lopsided margins. However, it remains to be seen if the Rohit Sharma-led ODI team are able to produce similar results, given how the seniors who will be featuring in the upcoming one-dayers had struggled in recent Test assignments, including in the five-match Test series in Australia.

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And while he is set to miss the three-match series against England, senior pacer Jasprit Bumrah’s fitness concerns have put a question mark over his participation in the ICC Champions Trophy, which in turn have suddenly reduced the Men in Blue’s chances of winning the ‘Mini World Cup’ for the second time in three years.

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Former India all-rounder and head coach Ravi Shastri for one, believes Bumrah’s absence from the Champions Trophy substantially reduces Rohit and Co’s chances of winning the tournament.

“Bumrah not fit will reduce India’s chances of winning the Champions Trophy by 30 per cent, literally by 30-35 per cent. With a fully fit Bumrah playing, you are guaranteed those death overs. It would’ve been a different ball game altogether,” Shastri told Sanjana Ganesan on The ICC Review.

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Shastri, who served as full-time head coach between 2017 and 2021, added that the Indian team management and selectors should not rush him back into action while he’s still recovering from the back spasm that he had suffered during the fifth Test against Australia in Sydney.

“I think it’s high risk. There’s too much big cricket coming up for India.

“At this stage of his career, I think he’s too precious to be just called on for one game out of the blue and asked to deliver. The expectations will be so much. They’ll think that he’ll come in straight away and set the world on fire. It’s never that easy when you come back from injury," Shastri added.

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In Bumrah’s absence, fellow senior pacer Mohammed Shami will be expected to lead the Indian attack in the Champions Trophy. Shami had made his first international appearance in the T20I series against England since November 2023, collecting 3/25 to bowl India to a thumping 150-run victory in Mumbai after going wicketless in the third T20I in Rajkot.

Shastri, however, notes the team management are unlikely to ask Shami to bowl 10 overs in all three games, and will be careful about his workload.

“It will be interesting to see if India play him out in all three, or they give him the first one and the third one, and then ease him into the Champions Trophy.

“But he’ll be watched very closely because 10 overs is totally different to four overs, and then you’re going to see how he pulls up in the field as well having bowled those 10 overs,” Shastri added.

After the series opener in Nagpur, the second and third ODIs will take place in Cuttack and Ahmedabad on Sunday (9 February) and Wednesday (12 February) respectively.