WELLINGTON: New Zealand pacer Kyle Jamieson is set to miss at least “three to four months” of action after undergoing back surgery this week, reported ESPNCricinfo on Monday.
Jamieson was originally supposed to make his return to the national side in the first pink-ball Test against England at Mount Maunganui, which started on February 16. England won the match by a massive 267 runs.
A suspected recurrence of the injury ruled him out of the series and subsequent MRI scans and consultations with surgeons confirmed the need for surgery.
No specific timeline has been set for the pacer’s recovery. NZ head coach Gary Stead hoped that the operation and rehabilitation will help Jamieson in long term.
“It has been a challenging and difficult time for Kyle and a big loss for us. He has been fantastic around all of our sides when he has been part of them. We just wish him well and hope we will know more in three to four months of what that end prognosis looks for him as well,” Stead said.
“A number of world-class players have had surgery in the back and it is different periods of time they recover. We just want Kyle [to get] the best chance of recovery because we know what a star he has been for us. Surgery provides a quicker return to play and that’s the encouraging thing for him,” added the coach.
The loss of Jamieson, who has taken 72 wickets in his 16 Test long career so far was felt in the first match, in which Kiwis suffered their biggest loss in terms of runs to England. It was also captain Tim Southee’s first loss ever since taking over the position after Kane Williamson stepped down from captaincy in December last year.
But Matt Henry’s return in the second Test, starting from February 24, will provide a boost to the Southee-led side. The pacer had missed the first Test due to the birth of his second child. He has 55 dismissals in 18 matches.
Jacob Duffy and Ish Sodhi have been released from the team to feature in Plunket Shield later this week.
Without Jamieson and Henry, Kiwis fielded an inexperienced bowling attack in the first match, featuring debutants Blair Tickner and Scott Kuggeleijn and never really made an impact in the match despite winning the toss.
England posted scores of 325 and 306, but their batting run rates of 5.57 and 5.06 per over allowed them to dictate the flow of the match. It gave them two opportunities to bowl and they put the hosts in troublesome situations in both innings.
This was England’s 10th win in 11 matches under the leadership of skipper Ben Stokes and head coach Brendon McCullum. Stead acknowledged that the focus ahead of the final match will be to use the cues from past weeks to try to apply breaks on their opponents.
“I think there is a couple of things that stood out to me during the Test. The way England is playing is not a surprise to us at all, but they are playing very, very well. And I guess for us it is finding ways we can counter that and I guess slow them down and the pace at which they are playing the game.”
“Look, they play at a pace that allows them to take key moments of that last match, as well. When I look at the positives, we bowled them out [nine wickets fell] in 58 overs in the first innings, and we bowled them out in the second innings. It is just how do you slow them down from the run rate they are going at. They were 230 for 6 in that second innings, so if you take four wickets for the next 40 runs you are batting for that period in the daylight as well and it could have been very different then as well. But they are the small margins that we work with.”
“As I said, we do not try and get too high or too low around our wins or our losses, we just try and keep getting better and keep tuning up our performance,” concluded the coach.
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