Gujarat Titans (GT) ace Rashid Khan on Wednesday spoke about back surgery after last year’s ICC Cricket World Cup and the difficulties he faced due to playing the tournament with low fitness levels . Following the 2023 Cricket World Cup in India, in which Afghanistan finished sixth, Rashid took time off from the game to undergo back surgery and returned to the game during a T20I series against Ireland in March this year . Now, he is representing Gujarat Titans (GT) in the Indian Premier League (IPL), where he has taken eight wickets and scored 102 runs for his team at an average of 20.40 so far.
Speaking to ESPNCricinfo’s The Cricket Monthly, Rashid said that before the World Cup the doctor told him to have surgery but he postponed it to represent his country in the tournament. He decided to get some injections before the tournament.
“Even before the World Cup, the doctor told me that I would have to have surgery, but I postponed the decision because I wanted to play in that tournament. He warned me that the back problem could get worse if I played, especially considering it was 50 overs, where my workload would be significantly heavy because I would be playing at least nine ODIs. He was afraid he would need major surgery, but I told him he had to play in the World Cup. . So we decided that I would take some injections before the tournament,” said Rashid.
Rashid said that after the big win over Pakistan, he celebrated and danced a lot all night and did not behave as if he had a back problem.
“Our physiotherapist kept reminding me that I needed to be careful. The entire Afghanistan squad was surprised to see me dancing and celebrating; [Afghanistan],” he added.
However, when he woke up the next day, he was in severe pain and played the rest of the tournament taking painkillers and in poor physical condition. “I told the physio I couldn’t walk properly. He just gave me a very hard look. I used painkillers to keep going, but in the last three World Cup matches I was literally playing at 40% of my fitness,” he said. he said.
Rashid said his back problems affected him a lot as he bent over and the pain went down to his shins.
“I couldn’t sleep. Sometimes I would only sleep at four or five in the morning. The only way I could sleep was by taking sleeping pills and painkillers,” he said.
He said that during his team’s last three games during the World Cup, his sore hamstrings forced him to slide instead of walk.
“I couldn’t lift my feet properly. I started eating all my meals in my room. In the last game, the coach told me I didn’t need to play, but I said I would do fine with painkillers. Because when I was warm up, I wouldn’t I felt discomfort, I could run, dive and everything, but after the game, for about an hour, I couldn’t move,” he added.
Rashid said that after the tournament he decided to have surgery. “The doctor told me, ‘This is your first MRI and this is your second MRI, after the World Cup, so you see how much bigger the disc bulge has gotten’. To be honest, I was nervous. It was my first some surgery in my career”, he added.
The spinner revealed that his doctor told him that a failed surgery could mark the end of his playing career, which left him tense.
“I had to sign this commitment. I was very tense the whole night before the surgery. I didn’t tell my family that I was going to have surgery,” he added.
Rashid said that during the surgery, the entire GT team, including coach Ashish Nehra, director of cricket Vikram Solanki and assistant coach Naeem Amin, were very supportive. He also revealed that he felt no pain after the surgery, but wanted to get back to the game quickly.
“Ashish bhai, who has undergone many surgeries, spoke to me a lot and told me not to worry. When I came out of the surgery, I felt no pain. I felt very relieved. The rehabilitation part, however, was the hardest. I really wanted playing again and I missed it. In fact, I was part of Afghanistan’s squad for the T20 series in India in January this year because I wanted to feel like I was on the ground,” he added. .
Rashid revealed that during the last T20I against India, which involved two super overs, he instinctively got ready to bat despite not being in the eleventh over.
“Finally, when I started playing again, it was one of the best feelings to be back on the field. I am very grateful to Naeem because he helped me a lot during my rehabilitation when I was in the UK for almost two months. I arrived early every day, from 5am to 6am, stayed late and helped with my recovery,” he added.
Rashid revealed that the surgery also affected his bowling, such as when bowling incorrectly, because he would need to use his back more and would get scared if there was any stiffness in his back.
“That feeling persisted throughout the series against Ireland, which Afghanistan played before the IPL, and then, as I said, in the first few matches here (the IPL),” he added.
The spinner spoke to the franchise’s video analyst Sandeep Raju about his problem and Raju revealed to him that he wasn’t hitting the mark like he used to.
“He also pointed out that my mistake was finishing on the leg stump and not in the middle. That’s when I told him I wasn’t feeling it because I’m not using my whole body. There’s nothing wrong with my back, but I just had this fear in my head: what if the injury reappeared?”
“So two days before the IPL match in Lucknow, I told him [Raju] I played bowling, which I did for about an hour. I could have bowled 14-15 overs in that session without any back strain. I played again the next day, the day before the match. That’s when I felt like everything was fine”, he concluded.
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