IND vs ENG: Major blow to India, star opener twists ankle during practice session, could miss 2nd match

In what could be a major blow for Team India, opener Abhishek Sharma could sit out of the 2nd IND vs ENG T20I in Chennai, to be played on Jan 25. As per a report in The Indian Express, the southpaw opener twisted his right ankle while doing warm-up for a practice session on Friday evening.

Abhishek Sharma Injured?

The report further suggests that the player was in visible pain and was attended by the physio. Abhishek Sharma, meanwhile was India’s best batsman in the 1st T20I in Kolkata, where he smashed 79 from 34 deliveries only. Eventually, he did not bat in the nets too because of the twisted ankle.

Now, if a scenario emerges where Abhishek is ruled out, India doesn’t really have a back up opener, and the team might have to promote Tilak Varma as an opener, along with Sanju Samson. Yes, there is an option on of including Dhruv Jurel in the team, but that looks highly unlikely.

Tilak Varma to Open with Sanju Samson?

As far as India pacer Mohammed Shami is concerned, he once again continued to bowl in the nets with a knee brace. He has missed out on the first match due to unknown reasons. He, in fact bowled with a shorted run-up. But later, after warming-up nicely, he bowled the full tilt.

Having said that, it seems that the pacer has regained full fitness, and wasn’t part of the playing XI due to team combination, where the management wanted to go with depth in the batting order, with the likes of Hardik Pandya and Nitish Kumar Reddy.

India Squad: Abhishek Sharma, Sanju Samson(w), Tilak Varma, Suryakumar Yadav(c), Hardik Pandya, Rinku Singh, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Axar Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Mohammed Shami, Varun Chakravarthy, Washington Sundar, Ravi Bishnoi, Dhruv Jurel, Harshit Rana.