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India star all-rounder Hardik Pandya opened up for the first time after the T20 World Cup 2024 ahead of the upcoming tour to Sri Lanka where he will feature in the T20Is for Men in Blue where he will play under Suryakumar Yadav's captaincy. Hardik was supposed to be the next T20I captain after Rohit Sharma announced his retirement from the shortest format of the game but the cricket board announced star batter Suryakumar Yadav as Rohit's successor for the T20Is. Hardik was reportedly snubbed from the captaincy due to fitness concerns.
Hardik will likely to miss the Champions Trophy as well due to injury concerns and to feature in the marquee event the all-rounder will have to bowl in the domestic overs. The Indian all-rounder finally broke the silence on fitness. Hardik who was Rohit Sharma's deputy in 2023 ODI World Cup, 2022 T20 World Cup, Asia Cup 2023 and recently concluded T20 World Cup 2024 will feature in the T20Is against Sri Lanka as a normal player.
"I never knew what fitness would do to me, but it's just that I felt it that for me I always wanted to be No. 1 in everything which I do, so in a habit of that, I kept training a lot when I was young, I pushed myself a lot, ran a lot so I had a very good strong base," Hardik said in an launch event.
Hardik said that he wants to be number one in whatever he wants to do and he has a very strong base.
"Obviously, there was not much knowledge about the body, not much knowledge about how to increase my fitness, but because my base was strong and I did the basics which you are supposed to do while training, it helped me when I came to the higher level." "I used to bowl if I'm not wrong 130s; higher 130s, I was able to go 140 plus, 142 by pushing, that's when I realised by 2017 or not as soon as I started getting more more into my body, more knowledge about it and that's when I start pushing," he said.
Team India will play three T20Is followed by three ODIs against Sri Lanka which is scheduled to start from July 27 where Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli will make a comeback in ODIs after the ODI World Cup 2023.
India's Squad for Sri Lanka series
India's T20I Squad for Sri Lanka tour: Suryakumar Yadav (C), Ꮪhubman Gill (VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rinku Singh, Riyan Parag, Rishabh Pant (WK), Sanju Samson (WK), Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Khaleel Ahmed, Mohd. Siraj.
India's ODI Squad for Sri Lanka tour: Rohit Sharma (C), Ꮪhubman Gill (VC), Virat Kohli, KL Rahul (WK), Rishabh Pant (WK), Shreyas Iyer, Shivam Dube, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohd. Siraj, Washington Sundar, Arshdeep Singh, Riyan Parag, Axar Patel, Khaleel Ahmed, Harshit Rana.
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