Australian captain Pat Cummins will miss the second Ashes 2021-22 Test against England after he was deemed a close contact of a person who received a positive Covid-19 test last night, a Cricket Australia media release said. (More Cricket News)
“Cummins was dining in a restaurant last night and did not breach any bio-security protocols. He isolated as soon as he became aware of the situation and has since had a PCR test, which produced a negative result,” the media release said
Steve Smith will captain the team in Cummins’ absence. Michael Neser comes into the playing XI to make his Test debut and Travis Head will be vice-captain. Cummins said he was gutted to miss the Test match in Adelaide.
"Gutted to miss this Test but really excited to see Neser finally get his chance in the baggy green. He has done the hard yards and is a seriously skilful player. Super frustrating but COVID has thrown us all some curve balls over the last couple of years. Will be cheering along!" tweeted Cummins.
South Australia health department said that Cummins will need to isolate himself for full seven days. Cummins went to dine in an Adelaide restaurant with friend and NSW Blues teammate Harry Conway. Cummins, who replaced Tim Paine as Australia Test captain, had a PCR test since that produced a negative result.
Meanwhile, Cricket Australia CEO Nick Hockley on Thursday said that Cummins and other players followed all the Covid-19 protocols that allow the players to dine out in small groups.
“Pat has done absolutely nothing wrong, was working completely to the protocols that our medical team had prescribed which was consistent with the environment here in South Australia,” Hockley said. “We’ve got protocols that flex according to the risk level of different jurisdictions, so we're looking at it every single day.
“Our protocols include our players need to dine in small groups and in many ways they are designed to mitigate precisely the risk we've seen unfold very unfortunately here in Adelaide. We don't want to completely lock down the players,” Hockley added.
Although it’s not yet confirmed, hopefully, Cummins will be available for the third Test starting on December 26 at MCG.
