After the high of winning the Man of the Match award in his debut Test for scoring an astounding 187 comes the low for India opener Shikhar Dhawan.

Dhawan injured his left hand while fielding at the point boundary on Sunday and is set to miss the second Test of the series — that too at his home ground, the Ferozeshah Kotla in Delhi.

Explaining the whole situation, a source close to Dhawan told Mail Today: “He hurt his knuckles while trying to stop a square drive off Phillip Hughes on Sunday. He actually ended up jamming his left hand into the ground. He was rushed to the Fortis Hospital by team physio Nitin Patel and the doctors performed an X- ray which revealed that there was no fracture. It is more of a muscle injury. But the doctors told him to not take the field on the fifth day as that could aggravate the injury.” According to the source, a final assessment is yet to be made as to when he can get back on the field.

Captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni admitted that Dhawan was unlikely to play in the fourth Test and that the BCCI would communicate about the opener’s injury later.

“He is likely to miss the next match, a detailed mail will be sent later by the BCCI,” he said.

With Dhawan virtually out, the problem that faces the Indian team is the lack of openers going into the fourth match. While Dhawan and Murali Vijay were the specialist openers in the 14- member squad, the selectors will either have to draft another opener or give a debut to Ajinkya Rahane, who has been the reserve middle- order batsman in the squad for close to a year now but has often opened for his domestic side Mumbai.

Although the selectors are yet to decide on who could be Dhawan’s replacement, according to sources in the BCCI, discarded opener Gautam Gambhir stands the best chance of making a comeback as he not only scored a hundred leading India A against Australia at the start of the series, after being dropped from the Test side, but also the match is being played at his home ground.

But the dark horse could be Delhi youngster Unmukt Chand. The previous tensions between Gambhir and Dhoni could end up benefitting the Under- 19 World Cup- winning captain.

Chand has recently done well in the finals of the Vijay Hazare Trophy and Deodhar Trophy.