Shakib gets injured, may not play in Asia Cup Final

Sustains left hip-flex injury during training session

Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan.

Mirpur: There was some bad news in the Bangladesh camp ahead of their big Asia Cup Twenty20 final against India with vice-captain and top all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan sustaining a "left hip-flex injury" in a training session.

Shakib was hit by a delivery in his left thigh region and was seen applying ice-pack yesterday. He also walked with a slight limp and looked in pain. Today he tried to practice but did not continue for long.

The dilemma in the Bangladesh camp is whether to play Shakib in Sunday's match and risk aggravating his injury before the World T20 qualifiers in Dharamsala.

Team physio Bayjedul Islam, however, expressed confidence that the senior player will be available in the big match on Sunday.

"Shakib has sustained a hip-flex injury after being hit by a delivery during yesterday's net session. These injuries in common language can be termed as thigh-muscle injury. These are known as 'conditional injuries', which normally heals in 48 hours. Today during option practice, he felt the pain again and didn't practice much. But we are hoping that he will play tomorrow," the physio said.

The alarming thing that he said was that medication, be it painkillers or injection, always do not work.

"Medication can be taken but it may or may not work for a particular individual. Let us hope and pray that he will be okay without any need for medication."