India has been under the unfortunate run of injuries, as one more player from its squad has been injured. This time is none other than the 3-dimensional allrounder Vijay Shankar. The all-rounder who was supposed to deliver by looking at his previous groundbreaking performances and expectations, barely impressed critics and crowd and just managed to draw the attention of memes and jokes rather than records and some marvelous innings.
He succumbed to the injury courtesy Jasprit Bumrah who was bowling to him in nets where his deadly Yorker flashed him at his toe. He missed yesterdays match against England due to ankle niggle and toe injury where Rishab Pant was allowed to fancy his chances. He faced a non-displaced fracture on the left toe which takes minimum of three weeks to heal. He will be replaced by uncapped Karnataka batsman Mayank Agarwal.
His replacement is approved by the ICC technical committee. He made his test debut in December last year but still not tried and tested in this kind of format. But to make things interesting he has been opening in his first-class cricket side and played considerably well last year and looks confident. So now the team management and Kohli have some thinking to do and to try something else this time after their loss against England and thereby exposing its middle order woes.
If management wants to experiment then they can play Mayank at top and whirling Rahul down again where he was supposed to play because surely, he is not getting his act on the top.
Vijay was picked over Ambati Raydu who was not selected due to its dwindling form in the previous year. But Shankar only played three games in which he scored just 15 runs. He faced a strong public backlash but was supported by his Captain stating the importance of all-rounders in this kind of fixture.
India seems to have been in the shadow of injuries, with Shikhar Dhawan India has failed to get quick good starts, Bhuvaneshwar’s absence hasn’t bothered much luckily, but Vijay Shankar’s injury means India will not have the services of the 6th bowler. Hope so India doesn’t face anymore injury ahead of entering in the qualifier, with strong core nexus since semi-final is surely around the corner.
