Bumrah injury: Coach Dravid 'hoping for the best'

'As of now, he has been officially ruled out of this T20 series of South Africa for these two games. He has gone to the NCA and we are waiting for the official confirmation on the next steps.'

Indian head coach Rahul Dravid is not ready to give up on injured Jasprit Bumrah and expects the pacer to be fit in time for the ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2022.

Bumrah had sustained a back injury and was being monitored by their medical team at the NCA.

"I have not gone deeply into the medical reports. I rely on the experts to tell me what it is. They ruled him out for this series and he is being assessed. We will know in due course what happens in the future. Obviously, till he is completely ruled out, till I get official confirmation that he is ruled out, we will always be hopeful. We will always hope for the best for us as a team and also for Jasprit as an individual. We will always hope for the best," said Rahul Dravid in the pre-match press conference ahead of the second T20I against South Africa.

On Wednesday, the pacer was rushed to the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru from Thiruvananthapuram to undergo scans for his back injury after being ruled out of the ongoing three-match T20I series against South Africa.

"As of now, he has been officially ruled out of this T20 series of South Africa for these two games. He has gone to the NCA and we are waiting for the official confirmation on the next steps. We will see what happens in next few days and once we get some official confirmation and we will be able to share that with you," added Rahul Dravid.

Mohammed Siraj was named as the replacement for injured Bumrah for the remainder of the T20I series against South Africa.

Bumrah's spate of injuries has become a matter of debate.

Bumrah played all the 14 IPL matches for his franchise Mumbai Indians and since then he only featured in six Internationals in four months.

Doing rehab at the NCA, Bumrah made a comeback in the preceding Australia series where he played two matches and travelled with the team to Thiruvananthapuram for the 1st T20I against South Africa only to be ruled out ahead of the game.

"To a large extent we manage to get everything. Not everything will be perfect. It happens, it's part and parcel of the game, we are not the only team which suffers from injuries.

"Obviously if they happen closer to big tournaments they can upset your plans a little bit. Everyone is making good efforts to minimise the injuries as much as possible."

The workload management and their experiments in the build-up to the World Cup may have come in for a lot of criticism but Dravid chooses to keep away from the "noise".

"I know there is a little bit of noise from the outside but in the group, communication has been very good and there's clarity. It's a bit unrealistic to expect us to keep playing the same guys over and over again, sometimes they are forced upon you -- like Bumrah.

"We played the same XI against South Africa in June if you remember, and people kept saying why don't they change. But in the group, we're very sure of what we are doing.

"Sometimes, there are a lot of things people won't know from outside, what are the niggles, how we are going to manage, how we are preparing for a Test when there's a series in Ireland. It's hard to just explain."

There has been a lot of debate on who is going to replace Bumrah if he is officially ruled out with only two weeks left for India’s World Cup warm-up fixture against Australia.

"We are quite comfortable that we have got all the skills that allow us to play different combinations and different kinds of XIs based on the wickets and oppositions. That's really important in a World cup when you play in 4-5 different venues.

"You need to have that little bit of versatility and flexibility in your squad that allows you to change things.

"Over the last few series, we probably have not been able to play that squad due to a variety of reasons. But most of the guys in the 15 now have had a pretty decent amount of cricket in the last six months."

Dravid said they have absolute clarity on the roles assigned to each of the players in the World Cup-bound squad.

"Within the group, within the team, we have been pretty clear about the kind of combinations we want, the kind of players that we are likely to play in the XI. You can't pick any XI months in advance, you don't know the wicket, and what it's like.

"We have been pretty clear about the skills we want in the 15. For me, that is really important. The kind of squad we pick to the World cup, barring injuries, what were the skills that we are looking for, different kinds of bowlers, certain batting skills, we have been very clear about."