Tushar Injury Woes Continue for KL Rahul
KL Rahul has been confirmed to be unavailable for the fourth Test against England in Ranchi. He hasn’t fully recovered from a quadriceps injury, which also caused him to miss the games in Visakhapatnam and Rajkot.
In the first match of the series held in Hyderabad, the middle-order batsman played well, scoring 86 and 22 runs. However, he suffered an injury during that game which forced him to sit out of the second Test. According to a statement released by the BCCI on February 12 before the third Test in Rajkot, it was mentioned that the player had reached 90% match fitness and was making good progress at the National Cricket Academy in Bengaluru.
The latest update from the board indicates that Rahul’s availability for the final Test in Dharamsala depends on his fitness. Another Karnataka batter, Devdutt Padikkal, who has been performing well in first-class cricket, has been included in the squad for the upcoming matches.
Rahul, who is 31 years old, has been dealing with fitness issues for the past 10 months. He had to undergo thigh surgery due to an injury he sustained during IPL 2023, which caused him to miss a significant number of games. Despite this setback, Rahul made a strong comeback at the Asia Cup and performed exceptionally well in both Test and ODI formats. However, he has recently encountered another setback in his fitness journey.
Bumrah Rested
According to Cricbuzz, fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah has been given a break by the team management and will not be playing in the Ranchi Test. This decision was made to manage his workload, considering the upcoming schedule which includes the IPL followed by the T20 World Cup in the West Indies and the USA. Bumrah has been the top performer in the series so far, taking 17 wickets at an average of 13.64, but has already bowled 80.5 overs in the first three Tests.
Mukesh Kumar Returns
Mukesh Kumar, who was initially dropped from the squad for the third Test, has been reinstated after delivering a career-best performance of taking 10 wickets for 50 runs for Bengal against Bihar in the Ranji Trophy. His fellow uncapped teammate Akash Deep will serve as the third seamer in the squad.
.India squad for the 4th Test
The India squad for the fourth Test includes:
- Rohit Sharma (c)
- Yashasvi Jaiswal
- Shubman Gill
- Rajat Patidar
- Sarfaraz Khan
- Devdutt Padikkal
- Ravindra Jadeja
- Ravichandran Ashwin
- Axar Patel
- Kuldeep Yadav
- Washington Sundar
- Dhruv Jurel (wk)
- KS Bharat (wk)
- Mohammed Siraj
- Mukesh Kumar
- Akash Deep
(According to Cricbuzz)
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