India's star pacer Jasprit Bumrah is gearing up for his first light bowling and gym session at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru under the supervision of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). After the fast bowler underwent for scans last week. The next 24-48 hours will be crucial as they will decide whether BCCI keeps him in the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 squad subject to fitness.
The deadline to make changes to the provisional squad is February 11. This won't be the first time India persisted with an injured player. During the ODI World Cup 2023, when Hardik Pandya got injured, a replacement was not named for nearly two weeks.
"Even if there is a 1% chance, the BCCI is likely to wait. They did the same with Hardik Pandya as they waited for close to two weeks before getting Prasidh Krishna as a replacement. Even when Shubman Gill was down with dengue, they didn't have any thoughts of looking for a replacement. Yes those two incidents happened during the campaign but approach with Bumrah could well be no different. This is just the deadline to submit the squad and they could approach the Event Technical Committee at a later stage to seek a replacement if he fails to regain fitness," a source told TOI.
Bumrah who got injured during the Sydney Test was asked to off-load. The BCCI medical team is yet to provide a substantial update on the 31-year-old's injury.
Two debutants in ODIs in Bumrah's absence
He was named in the squad for third ODI of the series against England but was later ruled out. In his absence, Harshit Rana made his ODI debut. He claimed three wickets on debut and in the second ODI got the wicket of Harry Brook.
Meanwhile, mystery spinner Varun Chakravarthy has been in scheme of things as well. On the back of 14 wickets in the T20I series and a stellar run in Vijay Hazare Trophy 2024-25, he got to make his ODI debut. The 33-year-old made Phil Salt the first victim of his ODI career. He conceded 54 runs from his quota of 10 overs.