India's Aussie campaign suffers early blow; Shami ruled out
Indian pacer Mohammed Shami, who returned to the team after a nine-month injury layoff, suffered a hamstring injury during India's first warm-up fixture against Western Australia XI on Friday.
Shami, who did not bowl in India’s 74-run victory over Western Australia XI in the twenty 20 warm-up match at Perth, suffered the injury during training.
“He sustained a Grade II injury to his left hamstring, which will restrict him from playing active cricket for about 4 to 6 weeks,” the BCCI media release said.
The Bengal pacer last played for India in the 2015 ICC World Cup in Australia and New Zealand, where he produced an impressive performance to take 17 wickets in seven matches. After returning from injury, Shami played two Vijay Hazare Trophy matches and two Syed Mushtaq Ali tournament games for Bengal to pick up three and five wickets respectively.
The BCCI also announced UP pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar as the replacement for Shami, for the remainder of the tour. Bhuvneshwar was left out off the initial ODI squad after a poor run of performances in the last six months.