As the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2022 is already finished half of the tournament, the Delhi Capitals (DC) side were hit with the Covid-19 virus. More than five members of the Delhi side including Australian all-rounder Mitchell Marsh tested positive for the virus.
Physio Patrick Farhart sports massage therapist Chetan Kumar, team doctor Abhijit Salvi and social media content team member Akash Mane have also got the infection.
READ | IPL 2022: DC vs PBKS match shifted to Brabourne Stadium after 5 covid cases in Delhi camp
Now, in their clash against Rajasthan Royals (RR), the Delhi team will be playing the game without their head coach Ricky Ponting. It has been learnt that Ponting did not travel with the Capitals to the Wankhede Stadium, in Mumbai as he is currently in isolation. A family member of the former Australian skipper has reportedly tested positive for Covid-19 recently.
Talking about the same, DC opening batter Prithvi Shaw also spoke about the condition in the camp in the pre-match conversation with the commentators.
"Everything is okay. Obviously, a lot of hectic things are going on in the rooms and in the hotel itself, everything is fine now. Ricky is not coming but he did message us on how we are going to approach this game and all this Covid stuff is going in your head, you're mentally prepared for it (the game) and to focus on the onfield stuff".
Talking about if the team will suffer from the head coach not being present, Shaw said, "He's (Ponting) the boss of the team and when the boss is not here you can feel a bit different. But we have other coaches here and they understand these things, we will be fine playing under them".
Shaw also spoke about how Ponting has admired his batting. "It all depends on my mood before the match day, if I want to have a hit or not, Ricky Sir always asks us what we want to do. When I am scoring runs I don't really like to bat and don't want to get worse in the nets. The boss is watching from the hotel room and I hope we don't disappoint him".
As for the clash, Delhi Capitals won the toss and opted to field.
Teams:
Rajasthan Royals (Playing XI): Jos Buttler, Devdutt Padikkal, Sanju Samson(w/c), Shimron Hetmyer, Karun Nair, Riyan Parag, Ravichandran Ashwin, Trent Boult, Prasidh Krishna, Obed McCoy, Yuzvendra Chahal
Delhi Capitals (Playing XI): Prithvi Shaw, David Warner, Rishabh Pant(w/c), Rovman Powell, Sarfaraz Khan, Lalit Yadav, Axar Patel, Shardul Thakur, Kuldeep Yadav, Mustafizur Rahman, Khaleel Ahmed.
