Australian skipper Aaron Finch is still doubtful to lead his side in their next T20 World Cup game against Afghanistan on Friday, November 4. The final call on his participation along with Tim David’s will be taken on Thursday evening.
Both cricketers suffered hamstring injuries during Australia’s last T20 World Cup game against Ireland. Both of them remain key to their side’s plan as they fight out for a semi-final berth.
Aaron Finch and Tim David ran together for about 20 minutes on Wednesday at Karen Rolton Oval, and while neither seemed too inconvenienced, they didn’t push themselves much faster than the jogging pace.
Marcus Stoinis also had to leave the field briefly late in that match due to a similar problem, which national selection panel chair George Bailey described as precautionary. He also opined that the final call on Finch and David will be taken on the eve of the game.
“They’re working through what they normally would after coming off a flight anyway,” Bailey said during today’s training session as quoted by cricket.com.au.”
“It’s nice to have the extra day for them to be able to recover and get a bit of work in, and we’ll keep assessing them over the next 48 hours. The fact they’re out there moving, always after a travel day it’s going to be pretty light anyway, but to see them out and moving and getting up to moderate speed is pretty good.
“I don’t think the time frame (on making a call on their availability) will be different to any other game. We’ll probably get together tomorrow post-training and work through that,” he added.
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Australia need to win all games to qualify for T20 World Cup
A win won’t be enough for the host nation to advance if New Zealand defeats Ireland (on Friday) and England defeats Sri Lanka since their net run rate is much lower than Group 1 rivals New Zealand and England, and all three teams are tied on points (Saturday).
George Bailey said that while conceding run-rate formulae will be used on Friday to attempt and raise Australia’s net run rate above nearest rival England, the team’s top objective must be defeating Afghanistan before turning their attention to other matters.
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