Now that we know for a fact that Rohit Sharma is still about two weeks away from rehab to be “70-80% ready” for test cricket, questions will arise about the BCCI’s handling of the injury. Aside from the obvious problem of a virtually absent communications wing, of course.
A quick summary might be in order. During the 2020 IPL, Sharma pulled out of four games with a hamstring injury. The Indian teams for Australia, selected during this period, did not include him, which in a logical world would have spelled the end of their IPL. However, he kept training and returned for the last three games of a dominant campaign by the Mumbai Indians. As a result, the BCCI said they added him to the team for Trials, still more than a month away, as long as he went to the NCA and showed his fitness.
Ten days later, he is still nowhere considered fit enough for the rigors of test cricket. Add to that the complications arising from the need for a hard quarantine, as opposed to a soft quarantine for those who flew out of the IPL bubble in the UAE, for two weeks, he is practically out of the entire tour. .
There was enough hint in the team selection for the Australia tour, and in interviews with national coach Ravi Shastri and BCCI president Sourav Ganguly, that the board did not want Sharma to return during the IPL. Both Shastri and Ganguly said, based on what they had seen in the medical team reports, that this could have implications beyond the Australian tour. It was also clear from Sharma’s return and all his communications and that of his IPL team, by the way, as confusing as BCCI’s, that he wanted to play the playoffs in the IPL and also be available for the Australian tour.
As a centrally recruited actor, Sharma is employed by BCCI throughout the year. So the first and most important question is, why did the board have to take the passive-aggressive route of press interviews and not just remove it from the IPL? They knew quite well the nature of the injury and the logistics of this pandemic-plagued world. The hamstrings heal with rest and rehabilitation. Playing during that period not only does not allow for rest and rehabilitation, it can also delay your recovery.
As a result, the BCCI is about to lose Sharma to an international tour. It can be argued whether Sharma had achieved a regular spot in India’s first Test XI, especially overseas, before a calf injury excluded him from the New Zealand tour earlier this year, but Virat’s absence Kohli made room for a hitter, especially one with an international. experience. However, that is not the point. This is a clear case that IPL takes precedence over international cricket in India.
He could well have been someone much more decisive for India’s chances in the Trials. Bhuvneshwar Kumar in 2018 is a good example – he was just the bowler India needed in England, but the board failed to make Sunrisers Hyderabad go easy on him in the run-up to the tour. A Sunrisers official had confirmed to ESPNcricinfo at the time that they had no instructions from the BCCI to handle the workload for Kumar, who was struggling with a low back injury, which ultimately ruled him out of testing at a time when even Jasprit Bumrah was injured. It is in stark contrast to Cricket Australia and the ECB, which micromanage their players’ workloads even when they are in charge of their IPL teams.
However, you can’t put all the blame on the board, regardless of the optics. The IPL is the BCCI tournament – you must do everything you can to make your superstars available to the IPL teams. In terms of the revenue it brings to BCCI, the IPL is larger than any international cricket. So while the board can’t do anything if a player wants to protect himself for an international tour, in the practical world, he can’t really force Sharma to sit down when he’s so visibly interested in playing the IPL.
Nor is it that Sharma played the IPL because of some financial greed. Maybe it’s time to wake up to the great respect of the players, and indeed the fans, keep the IPL. It is the most watched tournament in the world, bigger than any test series and even the World Cup. These cricketers are entertainers and they want to perform in front of the widest possible audience. It doesn’t mean they don’t want to be tested in the most comprehensive format of the game, just that they’re not willing to sacrifice for it as much as some test cricket lovers would want them to.
“With what has now emerged about the injury, it can be argued that the fastest possible way to get Sharma back to the park was to take him to Australia from the United Arab Emirates. That would have allowed him to continue his rehabilitation and training even while in quarantine. . ”
Nine years ago, Virender Sehwag delayed his shoulder surgery to play the IPL and appeared raw for the Trials in England, which India lost 0-4. He was not the only one who provoked outrage. Sachin Tendulkar withdrew without a victory in the test series in the West Indies because he chose to rest during that tour in 2011, and not the IPL that preceded it, in order to be ready for the tour of England. Nine years later, it may be time we normalized not prioritizing testing over IPL. In any case, prioritizing testing is a luxury that only three boards can afford. For years now, players from the West Indies and New Zealand have appeared practically a couple of days before their respective test series.
Like the gamers, the best that can be expected from BCCI is a balancing act, made even more difficult by the Covid-19 pandemic. With what has emerged about the injury now, it can be argued that the fastest possible way to get Sharma back to the park was to get him to Australia from the UAE. That would have allowed him to continue his rehabilitation and training even when he was in quarantine. We don’t know if he really needed to see an expert outside of the team setup to come up with the assessment we know now. This is where the BCCI should ask itself: could it have acted more decisively and saved those precious two weeks of rehab?
Of course, better communication, not only with the fans but with each other, would have saved a lot of unnecessary speculation, but this kind of impasse is something best to get used to to avoid repeated disappointments if you love your cricketers. to put test cricket on a pedestal or if you are the nationalist type and put limited bilateral internationals on top of a much more competitive and prestigious T20 league.
.
