Vijay Shankar ruled out of CWC19 with toe injury

According to a statement released by the BCCI, Vijay sustained a 'non-displaced fracture' on his left big toe. He reportedly suffered the injury while facing Jasprit Bumrah in the nets, during India’s practice session in Southampton last week. Consequently, he was left out of his side’s fixture against England, at Edgbaston on Sunday, 30 June.

The BCCI subsequently requested for opening batsman Mayank Agarwal to be Vijay's replacement, which has been approved by the ICC's event technical committee.

The development is in contrast to what was initially believed. After the side’s practice session on Thursday, Bumrah had assured that Vijay was fine, but the BCCI's statement reveals that the all-rounder will be out of action for a minimum of three weeks.

"We don’t obviously want to injure the batsman. Sometimes, when you play in the nets, nobody tells the batsmen not to hit. So they hit as well. It was unfortunate that he (Shankar) got hit," Bumrah had said.

Speaking to reporters after the England match, Rohit Sharma had stressed that Vijay remained India’s preferred choice for the No.4 spot despite missing the game.

In Vijay's absence, Rishabh Pant made his World Cup debut and batted at No.4, scoring a 29-ball 32, although it couldn't prevent a 31-run loss for his side. Pant himself had been called in as a replacement for Shikhar Dhawan, who suffered a thumb injury during his match-winning century against Australia.

Agarwal is likely to fly out to England later this week. The 28-year-old made his Test debut in last year's Boxing Day Test against Australia, but is yet to feature in a limited-overs international. The right-hander has had a rich run of form in domestic white-ball cricket, scoring over 1700 runs and averaging 58 in List A cricket over the last 24 months. In all, he has played 75 List A matches, scoring 3605 runs at 48.71, with 12 hundreds and 14 fifties, and a best of 176.