Former India head coach Ravi Shastri didn’t mince his words when he went on to name the “most frustrating thing” he’d to suffer during his tenure as India’s head coach, and something which he said he’s resolved till date.
With only a few days left for the start of the T20 World Cup 2022 in Australia, Shastri lamented the loss of key Indian players due to injury.
India will be without the services of Jasprit Bumrah, Ravindra Jadeja and Deepak Chahar in their campaign Down Under as all three have been sidelined due to injury.
Chahar had only returned after 6 months’ injury-forced layoff and after playing a few matches, has once again been injured. Bumrah’s case is even more curious: he missed a couple of months due to back injury, then was deemed fit to play in a couple of T20Is vs Australia before his back injury flared up and he’s set to miss months of action.
Shastri recalled how he was left annoyed when Bhuvneshwar Kumar missed the tours of England and New Zealand.
Shedding more light on this matter, Shastri said: “It was the most frustrating thing for me as (India coach), when you lose key players to injuries. We toured England and New Zealand twice. On all those tours, Bhuvneshwar Kumar was injured, where he’d have got a bagful of wickets with his skills.
“Now, you see Chahar has hardly played, and he’s injured. I was looking at the stats, Bumrah has played 5 matches since the last T20 World Cup and he’s injured. So, you’ve got to look at it very seriously, as to why it is happening,” Shastri told Ayaz Memon at a ‘Meet-the-media programme’ at the Mumbai Press Club.
Ravi Shastri gives advice to Team India’s management on dealing with injuries
Shastri recommended that if the Indian players need to be rested during the two-month gruelling IPL season, then so be it. He feels it is the duty of the BCCI President to talk to the IPL franchises about resting some of the key Indian players for a few matches during an IPL season.
“With the volume of cricket that exists today, it’s extremely important that you get the balance right of how much a player plays. When should he be rested? And there, a (BCCI) president can play a big role. Tomorrow, if a cricketer, for the sake of playing for India, needs to be rested in the IPL for a certain number of games, so be it. Where, a (BCCI) president has to sit with the franchise and explain that he’s extremely important for India first, and then the franchise,” the commentator added.
