Mumbai Indians suffer devastating setback! NCA denies Suryakumar Yadav fitness clearance for IPL 2024

Clouds are hovering over the participation of Suryakumar Yadav in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024. As per the reports in Cricbuzz, it is learned that the National Cricket Academy (NCA) hasn’t given him a fitness clearance for the 17th edition of the league.

Suryakumar Yadav reportedly underwent a fitness Test at the National Cricket Academy on Tuesday (19th March). But the management there wasn’t impressed with the outcomes and hence didn’t give him clearance to take part in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024.

Although there is no clarity till when Suryakumar Yadav will be out of the action, the reports claimed that the batter will be missing the opening game of Mumbai Indians (MI) against Gujarat Giants (GT), set to take place on 24th March at the Narendra Modi International Stadium in Ahmedabad.

As per the reports, Suryakumar Yadav will be going through another fitness Test on March 21. The Mumbai Indians management are optimistic about him joining the squad soon. There are high chances that he will be fit for Mumbai’s second game against Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Suryakumar Yadav expressed his disappointment too after he didn’t get clearance from the NCA for the opening game of the IPL 2024. He posted a story on his Instagram account where he shared a heartbreak emoji. This made many wonder about the same but now it can be understood as to why he posted that.

Suryakumar Yadav has missed cricket for India since December 2024. He injured his ankle during the T20I series against South Africa and after that, he was ruled out of the T20I series against Afghanistan in January. He also underwent surgery for the Sports hernia.

It was expected that Suryakumar Yadav would be fit by the time IPL started as was seen putting hard yards in the NCA. The batter also went for a few batting sessions but still hasn’t been deemed fit. It will be a big blow for the Mumbai Indians because he has been their best batter since the last few years and they would be hoping he gets fit as early as possible.

Mark Boucher hints about Suryakumar Yadav missing a few games for Mumbai Indians

During a media interaction with media on Monday (18th January), Mumbai Indians head coach Mark Boucher hinted that Suryakumar Yadav might miss the first few games for them. While talking about the injury concerns, he stated:

“We are awaiting updates on Suryakumar from the BCCI. We have always been under a cloud of fitness issues but we have a world-class medical team. We may lose one or two in terms of fitness but we have to move on.

“As the coach of Mumbai Indians, I am going to be a little bit biased and hope to see my best players in all the games. I have a soft spot for my players and I do understand that they might have niggles and that’s when I will fall back on my medical team and work with them accordingly.”

Mumbai Indians have been putting in a lot of hard yards in their training session ahead of the IPL 2024. They will be playing practice games as well, which will be held behind closed doors.