Exclusion of KL Rahul from two Asia Cup games throws a spanner in India’s World Cup preparations

The Karnataka batter is not “fully fit” and will stay back at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru to work on his fitness in a bid to be available for the Super 4s stage of the six-team tournament. That means Rahul won’t be in action before September 6. The last date to submit preliminary squads for the ICC Men’s World Cup is September 5.

India would hope it is only a (yet another) bump in the road and not an end of the road. For, India have bilindly put their faith in Rahul by picking him in the 17-member squad for the Asia Cup despite him being out of action since early May.

The Asia Cup was supposed to be a dress rehearsal for the World Cup. But, with just a couple of months and a maximum of nine ODIs left to go, India are yet to finalise the combination they would go with at the World Cup. How could they when five of their key players have been injured and out of action for a long time.

The biggest worry for India is the middle-order, where Rahul would have batted. Another middle-order batter, Shreyas Iyer, is also making a return from back injury that he picked up in March. Though Dravid would like to tell everyone that he “could have told you 18-19 months ago who three candidates for the two spots (No. 4 and 5) were”, the truth is he couldn’t have told us about the injury-forced long lay-offs and the disbalance it would create.

“It was always between Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant. There was no doubt,” Dravid said. “It’s unfortunate that all three had injuries in the space of two months. What are the odds of that happening? All three guys pushing for those two spots, had serious injuries, had to go under the knife.

“So, you have to react to that, put other people in those positions and see who can do it. Just in case, come a World Cup they are not fit. In that situation we tried a few people.”

Apart from the three who were earmarked for these positions, three other batters were given opportunities to bat No. 4 and 5 — Suryakumar Yadav (13 innings), Sanju Samson (6) and Ishan Kishan (6). Yadav scored 226 runs, averaged 18.83 with a strik rate of 88.97. Samson scored 155, averaged 51.66 at 98.72. Kishan accumulated 106, averaged 21.20 at 67.08.

Out of the three, Samson is not in the 17-man squad. He will be travelling with the team as a stand-by, though. The fitness concern is not limited to middle-order. Two of India’s main pacers — Jasprit Bumrah and Prasidh Krishna — are also returning from injuries that required surgeries. Bumrah had been out since September 2022 and Krishna since February this year. Much to India’s relief, both of them played in the three-T20I series against Ireland and bowled well.

But India would be keeping their fingers crossed and hope that the two remain fit for the World Cup. India are living on a prayer!