Former cricketers heavily criticised Shreyas Iyer and Shivam Dube for the missing the Ranji Trophy fixture against Railways, where Mumbai suffered their first-ever defeat at the hands of Karn Sharma and co at home. Questions were raised over their absence as Team India wasn’t playing an international fixture during that time and duo could have played for their state.

However, the latest report suggests that they missed the Ranji Trophy match on the advice of BCCI.“Team India’s medical team of the Indian team monitors the workload of all the players in the side. Iyer and Dube were asked to rest as per its advice. Mayank has played two games so far, but he needs to rest a bit now because then he will leave with the India A team for New Zealand on January 10. Whenever a player is asked to rest from domestic games, skipper Virat Kohli, coach Ravi Shastri and chief selector MSK Prasad are informed about it,” a source told TOI.

Apart from them, Navdeep Sinai also missed Delhi’s fixture against Hyderabad. As per reports, DDCA was set to ask the pacer for clarification. There could have been a case that he was also advised rest as Saini made his comeback from some issue.

It is to be noted that BCCI has also asked Mayank Agarwal to miss Karnataka’s next Ranji Trophy fixture against Mumbai, which starts on Friday. Mayank is a part of the India A squad for the tour of New Zealand and has been rested before the fixtures. Prithvi Shaw, who is also a part of the India A squad, will continue to play for Mumbai.

The team management has been taking a call on resting players of late. In 2018, Kohli was rested for most fixtures. In 2019, he was rested for Bangladesh T20Is while Rohit Sharma has been rested for the upcoming Sri Lanka T20Is.