With left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja all set to undergo a major knee surgery, speculations are doing the round that he might miss out on T20 World Cup in Australia. According to sources Jadeja might be out of action for an indefinite period of time.
“Jadeja's right knee injury is pretty serious. He is supposed to undergo a major knee surgery and will be out of action for indefinite period of time. At this point, if one goes by the assessment of the NCA's medical team, one can't put a timeline on his imminent international comeback,” a senior BCCI official told PTI on the condition of anonymity.
However, head coach Rahul Dravid, who is known to keep his cards close to his chest, was non-committal on Jadeja's availability for the T20 World Cup.
India head coach Dravid during a press conference ahead of the Pakistan match in Dubai, mentioned about Ravindra Jadeja's injury. The injury, he said, is yet to be assessed and hence it would be difficult to be sure about him being ruled out or not of the T20 World Cup.
“I don't want to rule Jadeja out of the World Cup yet. Let's see how he goes in the six-eight weeks going into the T20 World Cup. It's part of every sportsperson's life,” Dravid said.
“It's part of sports. People get injured. It's part of our job to try and manage them, manage how it goes,” Hindustan Times quoted Dravid.
"People get injured, a lot depends on the rehab, severity of the injury. I don't want to rule him out, make too many comments until I have a much clearer picture or better idea especially when the World Cup is six-seven weeks away now," the head coach said, trying to keep the seriousness of injury under wraps.
It couldn’t be immediately confirmed if it's a case of Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) injury, recovery from which can take a good six months.
But it can be said with some certainty that Jadeja will be out of action for at least three months.
It is understood that Jadeja’s knee issue has been there for a long time, and a close look at last one year would suggest that he is converting himself more into a batting all-rounder across formats, with his left-arm spin turning into a secondary skill from the primary one.
It is believed that the pounding that his right knee takes while landing of his front foot while bowling has had its impact.
In his senior career (domestic and international), which also includes domestic first-class, List A and IPL games, Jadeja has bowled over 7000 overs in nearly 630 games across formats, for 897 scalps.
Add to this the overs he bowled in the nets and the 13,000 runs scored at the senior level (domestic and international), and it gets worse.
It will take a considerable amount of time and a thorough rehabilitation programme before he can make a comeback to international cricket.
that put India on the brink of victory. Pandya then finished it off after Jadeja fell to Mohammad Nawaz.
With inputs from PTI
