'Forced to hide': Prithvi Shaw ‘out for most of the night’ during SMAT, says MCA

The Mumbai Cricket Association MCA has brushed aside Prithvi Shaws emotional outburst after his exclusion from the Vijay Hazare Trophy squad asserting that the temperamental batter has flouted disciplinary norms regularly and is his own enemyA senior official of the MCA while talking to PTI claimed that the side was at times forced to hide him on the field due to his poor fitness discipline and attitudeShaw had expressed his frustration at not being picked in the 16member squad for the Vijay Hazare Trophy in a viral social media post some days ago after being a part of the sides titlewinning Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy campaignIn the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy we were playing with 10 fielders as we were forced to hide Prithvi Shaw The ball would pass near him and he would barely be able to get to it the official said on conditions of anonymityEven while batting we could see he was troubled reaching to the ball His fitness discipline and attitude are poor and it is pretty simple there cannot be different rules for different players he claimedEven the seniors in the team have started complaining about his attitude now he addedDuring the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy Shaw missed training sessions regularly after showing up at the team hotel at six in the morning and being out for most of the nightThe youngster has defended himself by saying that Shaw who has attracted a lot of attention for his offfield activities and not doing his talent justice by focussing on his game would not get any favour from such social media posts the official saidYou would be wrong to think such posts on social media would have any impact on the Mumbai selectors and the MCA he addedShaws teammate and Mumbai captain Shreyas Iyer too had issued a stern statement on the night Mumbai defeated Madhya Pradesh in the final to win the Syed Mushtaq Ali TrophyHe needs to get his work ethics right And if he does that the skys the limit for him Iyer told reporters in BengaluruWe cant babysit anyone right He has played so much of cricket Everyone has given him inputs At the end of the day its his job to figure out things for himself And he has also done it in the past Its not that he hasnt he addedShaw was earlier left out of Mumbais Ranji Trophy squad for similar reasons in October after which he was given a specific fitness program to work on at the MCA AcademyHe is not following that as well properly the official saidShaw broke into the scene amid a lot of hype making his Test debut in 2018 as an 18yearold in a home series against the West IndiesHis lone century in the format was on that exciting debut but since then he has appeared in just four more Tests the last of these being against Australia four years agoHis ODI and T20 International career has also failed to take off and he hasnt played any whiteball cricket for India since 2021 These are markedly underwhelming statistics for a player who was touted as the next big thing in Indian cricket just a few years agoSeveral former players have expressed their concern about his antics and attitude both on and off the field A recent low for him was failing to find any takers in the IPL auction despite coming in with a relatively low base price of Rs 75 lakhIll tell you one thing No one is Shaws enemy He is his own enemy the MCA official stated voicing the frustration that the cricket fraternity in India has felt over him not living up to the early promiseWith agency inputs