David Warner will head to the T20 World Cup with just one run from one innings in the final three weeks of the IPL after being left out of the Delhi Capitals’ final game in which boom batter Jake Fraser-McGurk closed his blistering tournament with a duck.
Australian selectors opted to back Warner for his international cricket swan song despite seven scores under 30 in his nine innings in India and a campaign derailed by an injury to his left hand and the emergence of Fraser-McGurk as his replacement.
Warner, 37, has played just one game since April 20 ahead of Australia’s T20 World Cup opener on June 6.
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In Warner’s absence, Fraser-McGurk made a stunning impact at the top of the order for Delhi, smashing 330 runs from nine innings, including four half-centuries, at a strike rate of 224, the best of any of the leading 25 run-scorers in the tournament.
Warner played just a single game with the young dynamo, and was out for just one, ending hid IPL with a whimper and casting doubt over his capacity to fire at the World Cup, which begins for Australia with a clash against Oman in Barbados on June 6.
When he backed Warner in, selection chief George Bailey conceded the veteran opener’s injury would have to be monitored and couldn’t give a “definitive” answer on when he may be fully recovered.
“I think it’s been clear that there’s no break, but it’s still causing him a fair bit of discomfort,” Bailey said when asked about Warner’s hand injury.
“Obviously, we’ll monitor that. Hopefully, he can get back and play a couple more games in the IPL to finish off, but I think it’s just one of those ones, just some deep-seated bone bruising and just it’s gonna take a little bit of time.
“But I don’t think anyone’s going to been able to give him a really definitive answer on how long that’ll be.”
Warner made 168 runs in this IPL season, finishing with scores of 18, 10, 8, one and one, the final innings coming 22 days after his previous bat as he dealt with his injury.