Senior India all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja underwent a successful knee surgery last week, the recovery time of which has ruled the southpaw out of next month’s T20 World Cup in Australia.
The selectors have named Jadeja’s like-for-like replacement, Axar Patel, in the 15-man squad for the mega-event next year.
It has been reported that Jadeja suffered this right knee ‘freak’ injury during an “absolutely unnecessary” ski-board activity ahead of India’s Super 4 match against Pakistan in the Asia Cup in the UAE.
The left-hander had played a crucial knock in the group stage game against Pakistan and then took one wicket vs Hong Kong – that of their top-scorer Babar Hayat.
Ravindra Jadeja starts recovery, shares a pic with his fans
On September 6, Jadeja had confirmed that the surgery was successful and hoped to get back on the cricket field soon.
A week later, on September 14, Jadeja shared a picture of him holding a pair of crutches. “One step at a time,” Jadeja captioned his post.
One step at a time🧌 pic.twitter.com/WBgm4culoI
— Ravindrasinh jadeja (@imjadeja) September 14, 2022
Jadeja’s injury leaves BCCI angry
As per a report in the Times of India, Jadeja was asked to undergo some water-based training activity in the ‘backwater’ facility of Team India’s hotel in Dubai. The all-rounder incurred the injury while doing this training. Given how important Jadeja is as a player and that he provides the balance to the side, this cause of injury has left the BCCI fuming.
“He had to balance himself on some kind of a ski-board as part of an adventure activity – not part of the training manual at all. It was absolutely unnecessary. He slipped and twisted his knee badly, which led to a surgery,” a source in the know of developments told TOI.
“What’s surprising here is, Head Coach Rahul Dravid hasn’t ‘lost his cool’ given how the injury occurred. Ideally, one would have expected Dravid to question this entire process. All said, the bottomline is – India will travel to Australia without Jadeja,” sources added.
Fans will now be hoping that the Indian team management finds the right balance in the absence of Jadeja. India bowed out of the Asia Cup after defeats vs Pakistan and Sri Lanka, where India played Deepak Hooda as the batting all-rounder and not Axar Patel, who is more of a bowling all-rounder. However, that left India without a finisher as Rishabh Pant came in as the left-hander to replace Dinesh Karthik.
India squad for ICC T20 World Cup 2022:
Rohit Sharma (c), KL Rahul (vc), Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Deepak Hooda, Rishabh Pant (wk), Dinesh Karthik (wk), Hardik Pandya, R. Ashwin, Yuzvendra Chahal, Axar Patel, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Harshal Patel, Arshdeep Singh.
Reserves: Mohammed Shami, Shreyas Iyer, Ravi Bishnoi, Deepak Chahar.
