Jofra Archer will miss a third successive summer, and a second successive Ashes series, after scans revealed a recurrence of a stress fracture to his right elbow. The England and Wales Cricket Board confirmed the news when announcing the squad for next month’s one-off Test against Ireland, for which Jonny Bairstow returns after recovering from a triple leg break and will take the wicketkeeping gloves from Ben Foakes, who has been left out altogether.
Rob Key, the ECB’s managing director for men’s cricket, said Archer was “pretty distraught” about his latest setback, which was confirmed after the bowler’s premature return from the IPL last week. It is the third time the 28-year-old has suffered the injury, which appeared first in January 2020 and then again the following August, while he sat out last summer with a stress fracture to his lower back.
Though it is much too early put a timescale on Archer’s recovery from an issue that Key said had “baffled quite a few of the specialists that have been involved” England have not yet given up hope he could be involved in this year’s 50-over World Cup, which is five months away.
Key said he had “no concerns at the moment” about Ben Stokes’s fitness for the Ireland Test, which starts at Lord’s on 1 June, noting that while England’s captain has been at the IPL he has been so infrequently involved that “he’s actually been getting more rest than he would have done had he been doing anything else”.
Bairstow will keep wicket and bat at seven, returning as a straight replacement for Foakes, a decision the selection committee “agonised over for quite some time”. The Surrey player is understood to have taken his exclusion badly, but Key was encouraging about his chances of returning to the side in future, potentially for this winter’s Test series in India.
“He’s pretty upset about the fact that he lost his place. He wants a few days to get his head around it,” Key said. “I certainly don’t think this is the end for Ben Foakes. What you want to do when you play for England is show that you’re good enough to play at that level and he has shown exactly that in abundance.”
Ollie Pope has been named as vice-captain, the first time anyone has officially taken that role since Stokes was appointed as captain last April. The announcement reflects the player’s growing status within the group, but the timing also seems notable given that the state of Stokes’s left knee increases the chances of him being forced from the field during two intense months of Test cricket.
Ben Stokes (Durham, captain), Jimmy Anderson (Lancashire), Jonny Bairstow (Yorkshire), Stuart Broad (Nottinghamshire), Harry Brook (Yorkshire), Zak Crawley (Kent), Ben Duckett (Nottinghamshire), Dan Lawrence (Essex), Jack Leach (Somerset), Ollie Pope (Surrey), Matthew Potts (Durham), Ollie Robinson (Sussex), Joe Root (Yorkshire), Chris Woakes (Warwickshire), Mark Wood (Durham).
Jimmy Anderson is named despite the minor groin strain he suffered last week with the bowling ranks including Chris Woakes, who missed most of last summer with a knee injury and last played for the Test side 14 months ago, and Mark Wood, who is on paternity leave as he awaits the birth of his first child.
