In what comes as a bad news for the England team, it seems that their pacer Gus Atkinson could be ruled out of the first India Test, starting June 20, due to a hamstring injury. While it is not confirmed as yet, but this could be yet another injury concern for the hosts. England is yet to announced the squad, but have some problems going on with their pace battery.
Gus Atkinson All But Out of 1st Test
Ben Stokes has just started bowling after a long hiatus, against Zimbabwe. Jofra Archer played in the IPL, but there is no surety on his fitness levels. Then Chris Woakes is coming back after an angle injury. As far as Mark Wood is concerned, he might not be in the best of shapes for the series, after undergoing a knee surgery in March. Similar is the case with Olly Stone.
“Gus Atkinson is a doubt for the first Test against India later this month because of a right hamstring strain – adding to England’s injury concerns among their seamers,” a report in BBC read. Meanwhile, coming back to Atkinson, the 27-year-old had suffered the injury during the Zimbabwe Test only.
Injured England Pace Battery
In 12 matches so far, Atkinson has picked up 55 wickets, and has even scored a hundred. So, the stakes are really high for England at the moment. Now, from June 6, the second unofficial Test between India A and England Lions will begin, and it would interesting to see, what pacers does the team go with.
That said, the Indian team has already started leaving batches to England, for the first Test. KL Rahul is there too, and will participate in the India A second match as well.
India Squad for England Tests
Shubman Gill (c), Rishabh Pant (vc, wk), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudarshan, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Karun Nair, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel, Washington Sundar, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav.
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