Australia’s Test vice-captain Pat Cummins was optimistic about opener Will Pucovski’s recovery from his concussion before the first Day-Night Test of the upcoming four-match Test series against India, starting on December 17 at the Adelaide Oval.
22-year-old Pucovksi was struck on his helmet by Indian pacer Kartik Tyagi on Day 3 of the first warm-up match at the Drummoyne Oval in Sydney on Tuesday (December 8) and ruled out of the second day-night warm-up game starting December 11.
However, the young opener is staying back with Australia A squad as he was likely to make a Test debut for Australia in the first Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against India.
With David Warner being out for the opening Test, Pucovski’s recovery is the major cause of concern for the hosts, as the youngster still had mild concussion symptoms on Wednesday. Notably, Pucovski has suffered from concussion injury several times and it was for the ninth time.
However, Cummins hopes that the Victorian opener will be fine in time, saying “fingers crossed he’ll be OK” before the big Test clash against India in Adelaide.
In an interview with Sydney Morning Herald, Cummins said of Will: “It’s not great. But I suppose in cricket it’s been spread out over a few years. The good thing is he’s been through it and he knows how to come back.
He’s obviously got the best experts around him that are going to help him...I wish him all the best but it’s obviously not ideal. You just want to go out and play sport; you don’t want to think about these kinds of things or your health. Fingers crossed, he’ll be okay.”
The speedster feels for Will as the right-hander was in stunning form, scoring a whopping 495 runs in two Sheffield Shield matches, and in line to make Test debut but this unfortunate incident happened.
He added, “Will is in career-best form, he’s in a rich vein of form that a rare group of people probably ever get to experience and he’s probably a week away from his Test debut...Of course, you feel for him.
Cummins signed off by saying, “The hardest thing I found about injuries is largely they’re totally out of your control. You might be batting really well or bowling really well and something like this pops up as a major hurdle. Hopefully, he'll get through it.”
(With PTI Inputs)
