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Cricket

Injured Josh Hazlewood ruled out of 1st Test IND v AUS test

With seasoned pace bowler Josh Hazlewood ruled out of next week’s opener in Nagpur, which begins on Thursday, the Australian cricket team’s injury problems continue to rise. Hazlewood, 32, has been battling an Achilles injury incurred during Australia’s Test against South Africa in Sydney last month, and he announced yesterday that he will miss at least the first Test of the four-match series. Mitchell Starc, the left-arm quick, has already been pulled out of the opener, while all-rounder Cameron Smith is questionable due to finger issues.

Hazlewood, who did not bowl at Australia’s training camp on the outskirts of Bengaluru, is now pushing to be ready for the second Test, which begins on February 17 in Delhi.

“Not sure about the first Test. It’s still a few days away but it’s sneaking up pretty quickly. The second one is obviously straight after as well. So, we’ll play it by ear over the next week and next few days and hopefully Tuesday goes well,” Hazlewood told reporters.

The first Test begins on February 9, and if he does not play, Scott Boland may receive his maiden overseas Test. Lance Morris, who can bowl at a decent velocity and has been improving on his reverse swing, is also on the Kangaroos’ roster.

“Just a bit of workload management at the moment. Just managing the Achilles. I was bowling a fair bit leading into the tour at home and sort of just pushing up against it,” Hazlewood explained.

“Probably wasn’t recovering as well as I would have liked between each session so thought we’d give it a few days here straight of the bat and try and get over the hump and have a bowl from Tuesday and hope it goes well,” he added.

In the previous two years, Hazlewood has had several breakdowns, playing only four Tests and failing to finish a series. Despite the recent setbacks, Hazlewood’s goal is Test cricket, with Australia set to compete in the World Championships Final and the Ashes, in addition to the Border Gavaskar Trophy in India.

“It always feels the hardest Test to play, the first one and they sort of get easier as they go and you get to the other side, the end of the series, it gets hard again. Hopefully I can string a couple together on this tour,” he said.

“It’s still the same mindset. It’s still about taking every game as it comes. It’s obviously a huge tour and a long tour as well. It’s four Tests. It’s not a two-Test series where you might push things to get up for it. Four Tests is a long time and the Ashes is there as well and there’s cricket all the time. It’s just about getting it right, you don’t want it lingering around for months on end. The Achilles is a hard one, being a tendon it’s couple of steps forward, one step back occasionally, which is how it goes for everyone when they’ve got this type of injury. Feels like it’s heading in the right direction,” he concluded

Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023

February 9-13: First Test, Nagpur
February 17-21: Second Test, Delhi
March 1-5: Third Test, Dharamsala
March 9-13: Fourth Test, Ahmedabad

Squads:

  • Australia XI: Pat Cummins (c), Ashton Agar, Scott Boland, Alex Carey, Cameron Green, Peter Handscomb, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Lance Morris, Todd Murphy, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc, Mitchell Swepson, David Warner
  • India XI: Rohit Sharma (c), KL Rahul (vc), Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KS Bharat, Ishan Kishan, Ravichandran Ashwin, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Jaydev Unadkat, Suryakumar Yadav.

 

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