Pandya’s World Cup is over

Vice-captain Hardik Pandya, who was ruled out of the rest of the World Cup today, leaves quite a gap in the team, though it was his injury that enabled Mohammed Shami to enter the team — a development that made the Indian pace attack doubly menacing. The absence of Pandya destabilises the team — a specialist has to replace him, which shortens the batting line-up and lengthens the tail. Temba Bavuma, the South African captain, pointed out that India’s options are limited due to Pandya’s absence. “They obviously only have five bowlers, so they can, I guess, be put under pressure if one of their bowlers is not on their day,” said Bavuma. Rahul Dravid, who spoke later, said Bavuma spoke plain facts. “He just said the facts. The fact is that we will not be in a position to have a proper sixth option,” Dravid said. “So, yeah, obviously, the sixth option is something that Hardik gave us. But we have been playing the last four games without the sixth bowling option. We also played a couple of games in the Australia series before the World Cup without the sixth option.”