India’s captain Rohit Sharma has said that it is “up to the franchise” on managing player workloads during the IPL while Rohit had intimated that the players who had been eliminated from the IPL could be asked to go early to England before the final at The Oval.
India’s captain Rohit Sharma has said that it is “up to the franchise” on managing player workloads during the IPL. He also questioned whether players would leave if necessary.
Speaking after the conclusion of the ODI series against Australia,
Rohit said, “It’s all up to the franchise now. Franchises own them now. We’ve given them some indications or some kind of borderline kind of things to teams. But at the end of the day, it’s up to the franchises and most importantly it’s the players. They have to take care of their own body. They are all adults. So they have to look after their body and adjust if they feel like it’s getting a little too much, they can always talk about it and have a break in 1-2 games. I doubt that’ll happen but,”
The statement follows inquiries into why so many Indian players have been injured, which has shifted attention to player workload management.
India is currently without the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Rishabh Pant, and Shreyas Iyer, some of their first-choice players who did not feature in the recent India-Australia series.
“Look it is concerning because if the players are not available it is concerning. And we are missing players who are Playing XI players. They regularly play in the playing XI. Honestly, everyone is trying their best to get everyone in the park. We’ve been focusing a lot on management of the players a lot. This is why you keep seeing; we have to rest certain players at certain points in time. From our side, we could do our best in terms of handling them. I mean, I’m not a specialist to tell you why the recurring injuries are happening. Of course, the medical team of ours is looking into all of this and making sure that come to the World Cup we’ve got our best 15 players ready,”
said Rohit.
“Obviously, when you play so many crickets, injuries are bound to happen. So not looking too much into it, what’s available to you, what’s in your hand you can control that. Not looking too much into what’s available to you, what’s in your hand you can control that. We’re just trying to control all of that. Players are frustrated as well. They want to play; they don’t want to miss out. It is a little sad but at the end of the day, you cannot do much. I can see and can vouch for it that the people working behind the scenes are working hard with all these players. Freakish injuries can happen at any time. Shreyas was the best example. He was sitting the whole day, and he just went to take a knock and the injury happened to him. There’s nothing you could do about it. I mean the only thing we can keep in mind is managing players and giving them enough weeks and I think from our side we’re doing that,”
he added.
A week after the end of the IPL, the World Test Championship final will take place, and player preparation has already come under scrutiny. Rohit had intimated that the players who had been eliminated from the IPL could be asked to go early to England before the final at The Oval.
Earlier in the series, Mohammed Shami too had been questioned about the workload management and he had said,
“There’s still time for the WTC Final and the World Cup and as a player, it is not possible to think that long-term. You don’t know what will happen tomorrow. You need to be smart in terms of managing your workload. When you play international cricket, you know how much you need to work on. You understand your body well and that’s why you should not think long-term and take it series by series.
“I know my body well and can handle the workload, so I am taking it to match by match.”