Jofra Archer prepared to sit out of entire English summer, sets eyes on ICC World T20, Ashes series

Reiterating his commitment towards the England cricket team, pacer Jofra Archer has said that he has his eyes set on the ICC World T20 and The Ashes series scheduled towards the end of the year. However, he has ruled out any hurried return rushing to the cricket field and said that he has made peace with sitting out of the entire upcoming English summer where the hosts will play as many as five Tests against India.

“One thing I am determined about post-elbow operation is not to rush my comeback because my primary focus is to be playing for England in the Twenty20 World Cup and Ashes later this year,” Archer wrote in his column for Daily Mail. “Those are my targets. If I come back before then and manage to play in the home Test series against India — then fine, so be it. If I don’t, I am quite prepared to sit out the summer.”

He has said that the chance of adding few more years in his career is significantly higher if he reduces some months out of it due to a lack of surety over his fitness level. Having played with a recurrent injury over the last last couple of years, Archer asserted that if he does not time his return well, it could well mean the end of his cricketing career.

“I just want to get this injury sorted once and for all and that’s why I’m not looking that far ahead or at dates for a return to action — because if I don’t get this right, I won’t play any cricket. Period. I am not going to do myself any good by coming back before I’m fully fit, so I will take my time and do what is best for me and my life,” Archer added.

Detailing his elbow injury that went under the knife last Friday, Archer said the option of going through surgery was the last one on the table and he decided to go ahead with it only after all the other methods such as resting and injections failed to produce desirable results.

He had gone through another surgery on his hand after injuring while cleaning a fish tank at his home. The finger surgery ruled him out of the ODI series against India and the IPL 2021. He made a high-profile return in the county championship for Sussex in the game against Kent but could not walk away unscathed. He could bowl only a few overs in the second innings and walked off the field holding his right elbow.

“Surgery was always the last option and we wanted to exercise every possible strategy before we went down that route. It was the last thing on the list. It is not always a fix and in four weeks we will find out how things have gone,” Archer said.

“But after playing for Sussex against Kent earlier this month, it wasn’t a difficult decision to go down the surgery route because trying to manage the injury with rest and pain-killing injections clearly wasn’t working.”

The elbow injury first surfaced on England’s tour of South Africa in late 2019. Since then, Archer has been in and out of the England squads. He played only two out of four Test matches against India before travelling back to the UK after the T20I series.