Team India are set to take their flight for Australia on October 6th for the T20 World Cup. However, the Men In Blue are without their official “15th member” of the squad!
It means that the BCCI and selectors are yet to announce the replacement of Jasprit Bumrah in the squad. India will be without their spearhead fast bowler for the marquee event in Australia, which will begin on October 16.
Bumrah was officially ruled out from the tournament on Monday because of a back injury. Bumrah’s back injury – which had also seen him miss the Asia Cup before he returned for two T20Is vs Australia but got injured again – has opened up a slot in the playing XI and in the squad.
The “15th player” of India’s T20 World Cup squad is not confirmed yet even though the team is set to depart! The selectors and the management have until 15th October to announce Bumrah’s replacement in the squad.
Mohammed Shami is the frontrunner to take up Bumrah’s place in the squad, however, there are concerns about his fitness.
Shami, who hasn’t played any T20I for India since last year’s T20 World Cup in the UAE, is in the reserves. He was named in the squad for the recently concluded series against Australia and South Africa but missed both of them because of covid-19.
Mohammed Shami likely to be named Bumrah’s replacement
Shami has shown improvement in his fitness in the nets in the past few days, but the staff will continue to monitor his progress and will make a last call near to October 15. Shami has been asked to report to the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru for his recovery and fitness tests.
India head coach Rahul Dravid said this on Shami: “In terms of who the replacement is, we’ll have a look, we’ll see, we’ve got time till October 15th. Shami obviously is someone who’s in the standbys, but unfortunately for us, he couldn’t play this series, which would have been ideal from that perspective.
“He’s in the NCA at the moment – we’ll have to get reports as to how he’s recovering, and what’s his status after 14-15 days of Covid, and we’ll take a call, once I get reports on how he’s feeling, then we can take a call and the selectors can take a call on how we move forward on it.”
Deepak Chahar, who is also in the reserves, is another candidate to be promoted to the main squad as Bumrah’s replacement. Considered a powerplay specialist, like Bhuvneshwar, Chahar recently showed that he has variations to bowl in the other phases of the game; Chahar also adds batting depth, a facet that may go in his favor. Mohammed Siraj’s name has also been going around. Both Chahar and Siraj will be in action in the ODIs against South Africa this week.
