D’Arcy Short, the Rajasthan Royals’ batsman, is set to have a late arrival for IPL 2018 due to a lost passport, as per a report in Sportstar.
The report suggests he had lost his passport and applied for a new one and hasn’t received it yet,
“Instead of sending the passport by air freight, it was sent by road freight. That led to the delay, and he could not be in India on time,” a source told Sportstar.
The franchise purchased Short for a huge amount of Rs 4 Crore. It was his form in Big Bash League that forced franchises to go behind him. He had scored 504 runs in BBL from ten games. His BBL form also saw him making it to the national side.
In five T20I games till now, Short has had performed well and has scored 196 runs at an average of 49.00 with a strike-rate of 149.61. It is not confirmed yet whether he would be able to land in India before the start of IPL not?
If he has a late arrival, it would mean he will miss complete pre-season camp and would also lose out on an opportunity to gel up with the players before the start of the league.
It will be Short’s maiden IPL stint. Meanwhile, Rajasthan Royals have confirmed Heinrich Klaasen as replacement of Steven Smith.
The former Australian captain was withdrawn from the T20 league after being banned by Cricket Australia. Ajinkya Rahane was announced as his successor for the captaincy post.
Though, the franchise confirmed that it would bring back Smith in next year’s IPL.
It means Smith’s name will not be in the auction and he will play for Rajasthan Royals.
The one-time IPL champion team kick off its IPL campaign against Sunrisers Hyderabad in an away game on April 9.