Australian pacer Josh Hazlewood is still “not sure” of his chances to play the fourth Ashes Test and is racing against time to regain both full fitness and workload preparation for the New Year Test scheduled to be played in Sydney from January 03.
He said that he is likely to start bowling from the third day of the ongoing Boxing Day Test and will assess his bowling fitness after loading up a number of deliveries for the first time since the Gabba Test.
He had suffered a rib injury during the first Test of the series in Brisbane and has missed both the second and third Tests to recover from the injury. He said that the nature and extent of the injury are completely new to him and he is taking small steps back to return on the field with the ball in hand.
“I’m still a little bit away, (this Test) is probably a week early,” Hazlewood told SEN. “We’re still not sure, we’re going to take this week as it comes and likely have a bowl on Day 3 or Day 5, see how that goes and then build up from there. The workloads are still there from the first Test, but obviously, I haven’t had a bowl in 10-12 days and we’ll see how it goes on Day 3.”
“It’s probably more on feel this one, it’s a bit of an interesting one, it’s the intercostal in between the ribs, there’s a slight tear. I’ve never had it before, I’ve had the normal oblique side strain, which is the common one, but we’re taking each day as it comes and we’ll make the decisions on basically how I feel.”
Australia are already 2-0 up in the series and are also in a great position in the ongoing third series of the series and hence they would not be looking to rush Hazlewood’s return into the Test side.