Is Mohammed Shami's absence from Australia tour pinching India? Well that is a difficult question to answer but Shami's return in the international circuit, in particular the Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) will give some cushion to Jasprit Bumrah and Co. The stand-in skipper for the Perth Test, which India won by 295 runs, has been shouldering most of the workload in Australia at the moment, with Mohammed Siraj and Harshit Rana still working hard to find their foot.
Bumrah led from the front in Perth and emerged as the difference between India's win and defeat at Perth, despite posting a modest 150 runs in first innings. Bumrah did create good impact in the second encounter at the Adelaide Oval, but this time Australia handled the threat quite well and thrashed India by 10 wickets. Bumrah scalped four wickets in the first innings and got rid of Australian top order. However, Siraj failed to compliment Bumrah as it was expected of the former, which allowed Marnus Labuschagne and Travis Head to take the match away from the visitors.
Labuschagne scored 64(126), and Head smashed 140 off 141 balls to hand Australia a healthy 157-run lead. Labuschagne was dismissed by all-rounder Nitish Reddy, while Siraj got rid of Head with a yorker, leading to a heated exchange between the two players. If we look at Siraj's performance he did scalp the same number of wickets as Bumrah but that was at the fag end of the innings, which may not have helped India's case much.
Meanwhile, Harshit Rana, the third pacer, finished wicketless and leaked runs at an economy of 5.40 per over. Here is where Shami's absence was clearly felt and amid reports of the pacer being available for the final two Tests at Melbourne and Sydney, skipper Rohit Sharma was asked about his availability. The skipper tried giving a clearer picture on Shami and remarked that "door is very much open" for the pacer's return, but highlighted a new setback that Shami faced while playing the Syed Musthaq Ali Trophy.
"Door is very much open for Mohammed Shami but we are just monitoring him because while playing Syed Mushtaq Ali he again got some swelling in his knee, which obviously hampers his preparation to come and play a Test match. We want to be very careful, we don't want to bring him here (Australia) in a situation where he plays and pulls up sore. We want to be more than 100 percent sure with him because it has been such a long time that he has not played cricket," said Rohit at the post-match conference.
"To be fair to him, we don't want to put pressure on him to come here and do the job for the team," he added.
Meanwhile, Rohit confirmed that Shami is being closely monitored by the BCCI medical team. "There are some professional who are monitoring him and we will take the call based on what those guys feel there. Because they are the one watching him every game. How he pulls up after the game, bowling four overs, standing 20 overs. So we just have to be very careful and like I said door is always open for him to come and play anytime," the skipper said.
Shami's return to domestic fold
Shami last played for India in the ODI World Cup final in November 2023, following which he was forced into a long layoff due to an ankle surgery that needed surgery. Just before his much-anticipated comeback against New Zealand, Shami developed swelling in the knee delaying his return.
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Since the knockout round of Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy is taking place in Bengaluru, it is expected that the NCA (National Cricket Academy) medical team head Dr Nitin Patel and Strength and Conditioning trainer Nishant Bordoloi would be assessing him after Bengal finishes its campaign in the National T20 championship.
Bengal head coach Laxmi Ratan Shukla while speaking to PTI on Saturday said: "He (Shami) has already shed around six kilograms of body weight. He has played seven T20 games in 13 days. If he plays pre-quarters it will be eight games in 16 days. Shami himself wanted to play fair amount of domestic cricket and inform NCA how his body reacts."
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