NET BOWLERS GIVE ENGLAND A COVID SCARE AS SILVERWOOD TESTS POSITIVE

FROM in Sydney COVID continued to dog the Ashes tour when two local net bowlers tested positive, with the result only discovered after they had been bowling at England batsmen. The pair were yanked out of the training session immediately and practice was able to continue unaffected at the Sydney Cricket Ground.

The bowlers are unlikely to have been infectious according to Cricket Australia after recently recovering from Covid, even though they still tested positive. They had only worked with the England players in an outdoor setting.

Once all net bowlers were pulled from the practice session the England players supported each other’s training, with even Joe Root using the side arm to provide throwdowns. Questions have been raised over Cricket Australia’s handling of Covid protocols in providing the England team with people who had yet to be cleared with negative PCR results. And somewhat ironically the person who they would have liked to see out on the ground working with them, former skipper Adam Hollioake (centre left), was pinged out of action by a close contact. With head coach Chris Silverwood (left) testing positive back in Melbourne, even worse news was to come in Sydney where Glenn McGrath (bottom left) was also positive.

He will miss the start of the ‘Pink Test’ in which money is raised for the McGrath Foundation that he founded with wife Jane to support Macmillan cancer nurses before her death from the disaease in 2008. England have asked their six T20 players selected for the five-match tour of the West Indies, who are at the Big Bash, to leave the tournament early to prepare for the series.

They are required to return home by Friday in order to start ‘careful living’ to ensure they are Covid-free when they fly out to Barbados.