India vs Australia: Team India named 13 players for Perth Test to give Ravindra Jadeja time to recover

Sources in the know of developments have confirmed to Hindustan Times that while Jadeja was fit when he boarded the flight to Australia, an injury the spinner had sustained during the West Indies series came back to haunt him during the warm-up game in Australia.

The ambiguity over the sudden injury and speedy recovery of India all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja has once again brought to the fore the lack of communication from the Indian team management when it comes to injury status of players. While India coach Ravi Shastri had hinted that Jadeja was carrying an injury coming into the tour of Australia, the real picture is that the all-rounder had aggravated an injury on his left shoulder during the warm-up game against Cricket Australia XI.

File image of Ravindra Jadeja.(Action Images via Reuters)

Sources in the know of developments have confirmed to Hindustan Times that while Jadeja was fit when he boarded the flight to Australia, an injury the spinner had sustained during the West Indies series came back to haunt him during the warm-up game in Australia. In fact, that was the supposed reason behind India naming 13 players in the squad for the Perth Test as the management was hoping that Jadeja would get match-fit on the day the second Test started.

“If you realise, the team rather than naming a 12-member squad went ahead and named 13 players for this game. It was because of the shoulder issue that Jadeja was nursing. While it is true that he had no injury coming to Australia, the injury he sustained during the Windies series came back to haunt him during the warm-up game against Cricket Australia XI.

“He was given a pain killing injection to relax the muscle and help his recovery. While the doctor had said that it would take 10-12 days for the player to get match-fit, the management realized that he was only 60-70 per cent fit on the eve of the game. With R Ashwin out with injury, it was important that the team waited till the toss to decide on if Jadeja can walk into the XI. In fact, he was fit by the second day of the Perth Test and that is why you saw him even take the field as a substitute,” he explained.

Elaborating further on the injury, he said: “The loading and releasing was the issue and Jaddu felt that he wasn’t able to hit optimum level at the time of delivery. This is why the team management didn’t wish to risk fielding a 60-70 per cent fit player. But he is now fit and available.”

Earlier on Sunday, Shastri had said: “The problem with Jaddu (Jadeja) is that he had taken an injection four days into coming to Australia, because of some stiffness in the shoulder and it took a while for that injection to settle down.

“So when you look at Perth, we felt that he was maybe 60-70 percent fit and that we didn’t want to risk that in Perth. If he was 80 percent fit here (MCG), he will play.”

Later in the day, the BCCI gave Jadeja the clean chit and issued a release which said: “All-rounder Ravindra Jadeja complained of a left shoulder discomfort after prolonged bowling spells during the 2018, West Indies ODI series. He underwent a guided injection in Mumbai for this on 2nd November.

“This gave Jadeja good relief of his symptoms and he played in the Ranji Trophy match for Saurashtra from 12 to 15 November in which he completed 64 overs without any issues. He was thereby declared fit by the BCCI and selected for the Test series against Australia.”