India captain Shubman Gill reacts after his injury on day 2 of the Kolkata Test. (Express Photo by Partha Paul)India Test skipper Shubman Gill opened up about the nature of injury that he sustained in India’s first innings vs South Africa in the Kolkata Test. Gill had come in to bat and swept a ball for a four and while returning to his normal stance felt discomfort in his neck and had to retire hurt. The skipper ultimately did not take any further part in that Test and was also ruled out of the 2nd Test in Guwahati as well as the ODI series. He returned to the India team for the ongoing T20I series vs the Proteas.
“I’m definitely fine. My body feels perfectly fine. I spent a bit of time at the COE and I’m perfectly fine physically, and mentally feeling ready. I had a kind of disc bulge in my neck which was hitting the nerves. When I went there, I had a bit of a spasm before the start of play in the morning. And when I played the match, I think I got a strain on my neck and got a bulge which hit the nerves. I had to go to the hospital for a couple of days, but I recovered well after that,” he said ahead of the first T20I match vs South Africa in Cuttack on Tuesday.
When he was out injured, Gill had to watch from the sidelines as India lost the Test series against South Africa 0-2, their second straight whitewash at home after they had lost 0-3 to New Zealand last year. Gill said that the Test matches didn’t go as he had hoped, adding that they’ll look to win the T20I series ahead of the World Cup.
“Obviously, watching my team play the Test matches didn’t go as we would have hoped for. But I think we played the one-dayers pretty well, and hopefully we’ll be able to top off the T20s here. The last 10 T20s now we have before the start of the World Cup, so hopefully we’ll find our momentum and rhythm, and the kind of play that we want to play in the World Cup. Momentum is one thing definitely any team heading into the World Cup wants to strive for momentum. Apart from that, finding the right sort of combinations on different surfaces that we might have to face in the World Cup. There might be a chance we’ll play on some surfaces or some grounds where there would be a lot of dew, or some grounds where there won’t be that much dew. So finding the right kind of combinations for those conditions would be the key for us,” he said.
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