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Australia all-rounder Mitchell Marsh has been sidelined from the ongoing one-day international series against Zimbabwe and the upcoming series against New Zealand. Marsh complained of an ankle soreness he suffered during Australia's win in the first one-day international, on Sunday in Townsville as reported by Cricket Australia.
Marsh will be flying back to Perth and is expected to be fit for Australia's three-match T20 tour of India, starting on 21 September. "With the upcoming T20 World Cup still away the focus will be on giving Marsh ample time to recover", Steve Smith said.
"He's been playing some good white-ball cricket recently," Smith told reporters on Tuesday. "The way we set up our team the other day with bulk allrounders, he was a big part of that. It's disappointing for Mitch but there's some pretty important stuff coming up."
"He was a big part of our T20 World Cup campaign last year and I'm sure there's big plans for him this year. The priority is to get him right for that", he further added.
Wicketkeeper-batter Josh Inglis has been selected as Mitchell Marsh's replacement in the squad and will be with the team for the rest of Zimbabwe and New Zealand series.
Talking about Australia’s first game against Zimbabwe, the hosts registered a resounding five-wicket victory as they chased down 201 in 33 overs. But the star of this fixture was Cameron Green as he picked up five wickets while giving up just 33 runs in nine overs. Winning captain Aaron Finch was extremely elated with this victory and praised Green for a career-best bowling performance.
He said, “The conditions were as expected, perhaps dried out a lot quicker than I expected. I thought Zimbabwe bowled really well. You watch a lot of footage of the opposition, see them doing their work during the practice sessions.”
“The bowlers were spot-on and executed the plans well. The ball was seaming early on, there was a nice bit of breeze for the right-arm pacers, and Cameron Green used it as he followed Josh Hazlewood. Mitchell Starc is one of the best, if not the best, his contribution to a couple of World Cup wins has been exceptional. He has a bit of a tough start, hasn't got the wickets, but I felt he did really well,” Finch added.