Adelaide: India’s senior-most pacer Ishant Sharma was on Saturday ruled out of the Cricket World Cup owing to a knee injury after he was the only one among the four injured cricketers who failed in the fitness test.
The injured quartet of Ishant Sharma, Rohit Sharma, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ravindra Jadeja went through rigourous fitness drills and the lanky paceman, who last played during the Boxing Day Test match in Sydney was clearly not in best physical condition.
“It’s confirmed that Ishant has been ruled out and will not recover in time to play the World Cup. As per regulations, we had Mohit Sharma as stand-by and he will be inducted into the World Cup squad. Ishant is likely to return home,” a top BCCI source told PTI on Saturday.
“Rohit Sharma (hamstring), Bhuvneshwar Kumar (ankle) and Ravindra Jadeja (shoulder) have passed the fitness test. However to confirm their match fitness, the trio will need to go through the grind during the warm-up games against Australia and Afghanistan.
“The team management will need to check as to how Jadeja shapes up while throwing from the deep. That they (Rohit and Bhuvneshwar) have reported fit is the reason that they were presented for the Open Media Session,” the source added.
The BCCI has not yet issued any official statement on Ishant’s withdrawal from the team and his replacement yet.
Recently, after a four-week lay-off, the 26-year-old Ishant was picked to check his fitness during one of the tri-nation series match against Australia on January 26 at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG).
However the match was abandoned after 16 overs and Ishant didn’t get a chance to bowl.
But according to team insiders, in the very next match against England at Perth on January 30, he again reported unfit which raised a lot of eye brows as India neither played nor had any practice session in interim.
Spotlight on fitness as India take on Australia in warm-up tie
India will have to recover quickly from the blow of losing pace spearhead Ishant Sharma even as the fitness of Rohit Sharma, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ravindra Jadeja will be under spotlight as they take on hosts Australia in the opening warm-up game of the ICC Cricket World Cup.
The defending champions failed to win a single game in the recently concluded tri- nation ODI series as they miserably flopped in both departments, raising doubts if the team is well-equipped to defend its title under prevalent conditions.
Since the match won’t have official status, India can test all their batsmen as well as bowlers today as well as next warm-up tie against Afghanistan.
Ahead of their campaign, the team has lost Ishant due to knee injury, making the job even tougher for the struggling side.
He had not played much of the Test and ODI series but the lanky bowler had experience of negotiating the conditions.
The good news is that swing bowler Bhuvneshwar Kumar and opener Rohit Sharma are fit to play in the quadrennial event.
Rohit, when on song, is a treat to watch and it will be a test as to how well he has recuperated from hamstring injury.
Already when the batting line-up was struggling badly, India needs Rohit and Virat Kohli to fire if they harbour hopes of doing well.
Ravindra Jadeja, a key element in skipper MS Dhoni’s scheme of things has also recovered and eyes will be on him as well after recovering from — injury.
Having him in the side gives the team an option of having more arsenal.
The team will also have to decide if off-spinner R Ashwin was a better choice or Axar Patel.
Despite his continuous failure, Shikhar Dhawan is likely to open the batting and these two games will be the last chances that he will get to cement his place in the playing XI.
There was experiment with Virat Kohli’s batting slot in the tri-series and the management also has to decide quickly on giving him a final slot.
All this has to be decided today and on Tuesday when the team plays minnows Afghanistan in the final warm up game before the big clash against arch-rivals Pakistan on February 15. (PTI)