Team India opener Shikhar Dhawan likely to miss West Indies ODIs: Report
Team India opener Shikhar Dhawan missed out on the ongoing three T20Is versus West Indies due to a knee injury. It was a late blow to the Virat Kohli-led Indian cricket team prior to the series as Sanju Samson came in as a replacement. Ahead of the T20I series decider, at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai on Wednesday (December 11), the hosts may be dealt with another blow as the left-hander might sit out of the ODIs as well.
The three T20Is will be followed by an equal number of ODIs shortly. While the final T20I will be played on December 11, the ODI series opener is scheduled to take place on December 15 in Chennai. Thus, this leaves the 33-year-old, Dhawan, with minimal time to recover from his knee injury, attained while representing Delhi in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy 2019-20 edition.
After being declared unfit for the T20Is, BCCI had released a statement: The BCCI Medical Team assessed him to review the healing of his wound. The BCCI Medical Team has suggested that Dhawan needs some more time for his stitches to come off and his wound to heal completely.
While Samson replaced Dhawan, he is yet to feature in the playing XI for the side. As per a report in Bangalore Mirror, the Kerala wicketkeeper-batsman might replace Dhawan in the ODI squad as well. The other contenders include: Shubman Gill and Test opener Mayank Agarwal.
Talking about the West Indies series, so far, the visitors have given a tough fight to Team India and bounced back after a 6-wicket loss in the T20I opener in Hyderabad. They came on top in the second and penultimate tie in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala by virtue of an eight-wicket win in pursuit of 171.
ODI Squad:
Virat Kohli (capt), Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, KL Rahul, Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Rishabh Pant (wk), Shivam Dube, Kedar Jadhav, Ravindra Jadeja, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Deepak Chahar, Mohammed Shami, Bhuvneshwar Kumar
