Jhye Richardson among the quicks vying for a Boxing Day berth after Aussies put their captain on ice
Pat Cummins has been ruled out of the rest of the Ashes series but coach Andrew McDonald insists Mitchell Starc, who Australia’s medical staff have labelled a physical “freak”, will be right for the Boxing Day Test.
The Aussies are now weighing up whether Cummins will be considered for February’s T20 World Cup after shutting down their Test captain for the home summer having sewn up the Ashes in Adelaide last week.
Scott Boland is on trick to overcome a hip niggle to play his home Melbourne Test while the hosts are also confident Starc will be okay to play despite that pair having bowled the most overs in this series.
Cummins pushed the limits of his rehabilitation from a back stress injury to return in Adelaide. After taking six wickets and captaining Australia to a series victory, Australia are now putting the 32-year-old on ice.
“He won’t play any part in the rest of the series,” McDonald told reporters on Tuesday.
“That was a discussion that we had a long time out around his return. Yeah, we were taking on some risk. We’ve now won the series, and that was the goal.
“To position him for further risk and jeopardise him long term is not something that we want to do.
“Pat’s really comfortable with that. If he had any setback in the build-in as well, we would have shut him down straight away.
“Everything went really smoothly, and full credit to him, the medical team and to navigate through that risk profile, to get him back and take six wickets in that game and nail the Ashes series was incredibly pleasing for everyone associated with that.”
More to come.
2025-26 NRMA Insurance Men’s Ashes
First Test: Australia won by eight wickets
Second Test: Australia won by eight wickets
Third Test: Australia won by 82 runs
Fourth Test: December 26-30: MCG, Melbourne, 10:30am AEDT
Fifth Test: January 4-8: SCG, Sydney, 10:30am AEDT
Australia squad (fourth Test only): Steve Smith (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey, Brendan Doggett, Cameron Green, Travis Head, Josh Inglis, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Todd Murphy, Michael Neser, Jhye Richardson, Mitchell Starc, Jake Weatherald, Beau Webster
England squad: Ben Stokes (c), Harry Brook (vc), Jofra Archer, Gus Atkinson, Shoaib Bashir, Jacob Bethell, Brydon Carse, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Matthew Fisher, Will Jacks, Ollie Pope, Matthew Potts, Joe Root, Jamie Smith (wk), Josh Tongue
