India vs Sri Lanka: Eight Indian players ruled out of entire T20I series

A day after Indian all-rounder Krunal Pandya tested positive for Covid-19 amid the country’s ongoing T20I series against Sri Lanka, eight other players from the Indian team, including skipper Shikhar Dhawan, have been ruled out of the remainder of the series after being deemed close contacts of Krunal Pandya.

The eight key players who will be left out of the second and third matches of the series include Hardik Pandya, Ishan Kishan, Krishnappa Gowtham, Prithvi Shaw, Suryakumar Yadav, Manish Pandey, Yuzvendra Chahal and Shikhar Dhawan. Following Krunal Pandya’s diagnosis yesterday, the second T20I match between India and Sri Lanka was postponed by a day. 

“The second T20I between Sri Lanka and India originally scheduled to be played on July 27 has been pushed forward by a day and will now take place on Wednesday, July 28,” BCCI secretary Jay Shah said in a media statement yesterday. Further, all the players and other members of the team who had come in close contact with Krunal in the last few days were asked to get tested for the virus. Even though the Covid test results of the eight players came out as negative, all of them are currently isolating. 

“Krunal is symptomatic with cough and throat pain. He is obviously out of the series and will not be able able to return with rest of the squad. However the good news is that all his eight close contacts who were identified by the BCCI medical officer (Dr Abhijit Salvi) have tested negative. But as a precautionary measure can’t take the field,” a BCCI source was quoted as saying. In the absence of Shikhar Dhawan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar is expected to lead the team.