Murali Sreeshankar had made the cut for Paris Olympics after winning the Asian Championship silver in Bangkok with 8.37m. The Olympic qualification mark was 8.27m.

New Delhi: India won’t be able to see Murali Sreeshankar at the Paris Olympics after the long jumper was ruled out due to a knee injury. The Commonwealth Games and Asian Games silver medallist Sreeshankar, ranked no.2 in the world, informed about his injury on social media and said ‘it felt like a nightmare’. According to his father, S. Murali, who is also Sreeshankar’s coach, the 25-year-old injured his take-off knee on Tuesday while training at Palakkad.

“He injured his left knee, the take-off knee, while training at Palakkad on Tuesday evening. There was no inkling that something like this would happen, it happened during a short pop-up jump. He sat down on the pit immediately,” S Murali was quoted as saying to Sportstar.

Sreeshankar was quickly taken to Mumbai for treatment. “He has been taken to the Kokilaben Hospital in Mumbai…they say he needs surgery and it could take about one and half years to regain his old form,” the father added.