New Delhi: Paras Mhambrey, who was the bowling coach of the Indian team during the Sri Lanka tour, has given an update about the fitness of the Indian team's star all-rounder Hardik Pandya. He says that Pandya is slowly gaining fitness and should be able to bowl in the second phase of IPL 2021 and the T20 World Cup to be played after that.
“With Hardik, we are obviously slowly taking it forward. I am not going to push him in terms of the number of overs to be bowled. He is pretty much being monitored on how much we are going to push him. We have to slowly build up,” Paras Mhambrey told IANS.
Mhambrey, who has served as the bowling coach of India A, is currently a bowling coach at the National Cricket Academy. He said that it is important to manage Pandya's workload ahead of the T20 World Cup. The T20 World Cup will begin on October 17. India will play its first match against Pakistan in Dubai on October 24.
“The World Cup is coming. For us, knowing that he is going to play a very crucial role for us, it is important to manage his bowling workload very well. We know the batting that he offers you. But if we add the bowling to it, he brings a different dimension. In that sense we are working on it. Everyone - strength & conditioning department and the physios – is in sync and we have chatted it out,” Mhambrey added.
In the recently-concluded limited over series played against Sri Lanka, Hardik Pandya bowled but could not complete all the overs of his quota. Mhambrey said that he's sure that the star all-rounder will bowl in the IPL and it will be decide whether he'll bowl in the World Cup or not.