Abhishek Sharma and Axar Patel added to NADA’s RTP
India’s T20 World Cup-winning stars Abhishek Sharma and Axar Patel were noticeable additions to the National Anti-Doping Agency’s (NADA) Registered Testing Pool, which was dominated by athletics, for the second quarter of the ongoing year.
Abhishek and Axar have replaced Smriti Mandhana and Shreyas Iyer in the latest list of 348 sportspersons in the RTP who will be required to share their whereabouts with the anti-doping agency and be available for testing in a specified window every day.
Three failures to provide whereabouts is considered a doping violation.
The other cricketing names remained unchanged with Test and ODI skipper Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Hardik Pandya, Rishabh Pant, Jasprit Bumrah, K L Rahul Arshdeep Singh and Tilak Verma among those picked.
From the women’s team, which won a historic ODI World Cup last year, all-rounder Deepti Sharma and Shafali Verma continue to be on the list alongside Renuka Singh Thakur.
In all, 14 cricketers have been placed in the list by the NADA.
The athletics count, which was 118 in the previous NADA RTP, rose to 134 now and featured all major names such as steeplechaser Avinash Sable, hurdler Jyothi Yarraji, decathlete Tejaswin Shankar and sprinter Animesh Kujur among others.
Long jumpers Shaili Singh and M Sreeshankar and discus thrower Tajinderpal Singh Toor have also been named.
There are three archers as well in veteran Deepika Kumari, Rakesh Kumar Archery and celebrated para-archer Sheetal Devi.
From hockey, senior stars Manpreet Singh, skipper Harmanpreet Singh, Amit Rohidas and Hardik Singh are there along with women’s team captain Salima Tete, Savita Punia, and Navneet Kaur.
