"This is an injury that I’ve also contracted" - Ravichandran Ashwin on Suryakumar Yadav being diagnosed with sports hernia
Team India's dynamic batter Suyrakumar Yadav is currently on the sidelines due to a sports hernia injury. Reacting to it, Ravichandran Ashwin revealed that he had also gone through a similar injury earlier in his career.
Ashein also shared details about the methods he used during his rehabilitation to recover from the injury. Speaking about the conservative approach he took to regain full fitness, here's what Ashwin said in his latest YouTube video:
"This is an injury that I’ve also contracted. And I managed it in a sustained and conservative manner. It’s called sports hernia or athletic pubalgia. I am not a doctor to explain all the details about this injury, but I managed it conservatively. With weight training, by not doing overhead lifts, by doing many unilateral exercises, by doing many isometric holds, and by doing a few activations in the course of management."
Suryakumar Yadav hurt his ankle during India's third and final T20I against South Africa in Johannesburg last December. It was later revealed that the batter was also dealing with a sports hernia.
As a result, the No. 1 ranked T20I batter was ruled out of the upcoming three-match home T20I series against Afghanistan. He could return to cricketing action in the forthcoming edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024.
"I played the entire series with my leg locking itself whenever I turned or bowled" - Ravichandran Ashwin on India's Test series vs England in 2016
Sharing more details about his injury, Ravichandran Ashwin stated that he felt a slight discomfort on his leg while playing football in practice in Rajkot during India's home Test series against England in 2016.
He disclosed that he played the entire series despite being in pain. Ashwin said:
"At Rajkot, we were playing football. The football-playing culture was not part of the team’s practice then. But we were just part of the circle and were passing the ball. At that point in time, when I stretched my leg for a pass, I felt a slight pull. I thought it was an adductor pull and didn’t want to strain it further, so I went inside. I played the entire series with my leg locking itself whenever I turned or bowled.
"The pain was at various places. Sometimes to the adductor, sometimes to the groin, and sometimes to the abdomen. As a domino effect of this event, my adductor muscle got torn in England in 2018." he added.
The 37-year-old suggested that it led to an abdominal tear during the Test series opener against Australia in Adelaide in 2018. He suggested that he suffered the injury during the first innings, but still ended up bowling a lot of overs.
"Due to that, I had an abdominal tear in Australia later. As a bowler, I have to manage my workload more consciously because of this. I don’t have a choice anyway other than to put in the hard yards for 40–50 overs. When I had an abdomen tear at Adelaide, I had bowled about 63 overs. There were some 40–50 odd overs in the first inning. The tear happened mid-inning. And then I completed 63 overs in total in the second innings and took three wickets along with it." said Ashwin.
Explaining why he chose to go under the knife to treat the injury, Ashwin elaborated:
"How I managed it at that time was that I swallowed a tablet, and every time I turned in my action, there was a pulling sensation. So, it is a very horrible injury to face. There are many reasons why I didn’t go to surgery. Once I came to know that it could be managed conservatively, I chose that. But it takes a period of time for it to resolve, and I have to calculate the problems it might give me and arrest those issues one by one."
Ashwin was ruled out of the remainder of the Test series due to the injury. The Virat Kohli-led side created history by securing a 2-1 victory to clinch their first-ever Test series win on Australian soil.