The 32-year-old played just one Ashes Test against England, and he was named in the preliminary squad for the 20-team tournament.
However, just days before the start of the T20 World Cup, Cummins’ name was withdrawn, and he was replaced by Ben Dwarshius. However, he remains hopeful of leading the SunRisers Hyderabad, the 2016 champions, in the upcoming IPL season.
Cummins said that the eventual final decision will be dictated by the status of his job; however, he remains hopeful of making the trip to lead the Orange Army for the third season in a row. SunRisers have a solid batting lineup, consisting of Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Ishan Kishan, and Heinrich Klaasen; they are expected to once again set the stage on fire when the IPL begins in March 2026.
“We’ll just be guided by my back. We’ll have another scan in a few weeks, and if it’s good, then we’ll have a slow build-up,” he told the Australian Associated Press.
“T20s are a little bit easier to get up for (than Tests), that’s why I was so close to getting up for this World Cup,” he added.
Australia’s chances in the T20 World Cup have dwindled significantly, considering the pace attack. Cummins has been ruled out, Josh Hazlewood won’t be available for the initial few games, and Mitchell Starc has retired.
Cummins said he wanted to play the tournament, but in the end, he decided to prioritise the upcoming calendar, where Australia will play plenty of Test matches, including five matches against India early 2027.
“It was really unfortunate. I feel pretty good, just a minor setback, and just ran out of time, really. I’ll rest up for a few weeks and go from there,” said Cummins.
“We knew after the (Adelaide) Test match (in the Ashes), we were going to need somewhere between four and eight weeks to let the bone settle right down before then building back up. Initially, we thought it might only be four weeks, because I was feeling really good, but I just had a follow-up scan. They thought it probably needed another couple of weeks, so the timeline just became a bit too tight,” he added.
‘Good to be conservative’
The Australian Test and ODI captain reckons it was good on his part to be conservative for now, given the amount of cricket coming up for the national team.
“We thought the first half of the year was a pretty good time to be conservative with the amount of cricket that’s coming up,” he said.
“We’ll get it right, then hopefully that will mean you won’t have to worry about it, and you can just go out and play all those Test matches. Whereas, if you’re not careful with it now and it flares up, you’re chasing your tail a bit,” he added.