Injured Hashim Amla to Miss Australia Tour as Well

Cricketnext Staff | Updated: October 15, 2018, 6:08 PM IST

Hashim Amla will miss South Africa's tour of Australia for a short limited-overs series after failing to recover from a finger injury he sustained during the Caribbean Premier League. Amla was also forced to miss the recently concluded series against Zimbabwe due to the injury.

In Amla's absence, one of Aiden Markram, Dean Elgar and Reeza Hendricks is expected to partner Quinton de Kock at the top of the order.

"There are a lot of guys we have in our thoughts who will be in the squad to Australia," South Africa coach Ottis Gibson said on Sunday (October 14). "Hashim is injured, he is out of the squad already, as a selection group we have already discussed that with him. We want to give him as much time as possible for him to get ready for the next set of cricket that he has coming up.

"We know that Quinny and Hashim has been a fantastic opening pair for the Proteas for a long time, and we also know that Reeza Hendricks and Aiden Markram have also been very good in franchise cricket. The wickets at the start of the series, especially in one-day cricket were a bit tough for batting, so from that point of view we didn't get to see as much as we would have liked, but we know where we are with those two."

Gibson was full of praise of the bowling unit and said that the performance of the senior bowlers Imran Tahir and Dale Steyn was heartening.

"We had given Tahir time off (from the tour of Sri Lanka) to allow us to see other players and he has come back and shown us why he is our number one," Gibson said. "I know what Rabada and Ngidi can do but for me the real excitement was watching Dale Steyn bowling in the second game in Bloemfontein. It was fantastic to see him back to that level again, bowling quickly with that skill and accuracy. That is the real exciting part for me."

The South Africa coach, however, said that they would stop experimenting with the squad and said the window for being in contention for the World Cup next year was fast closing.

"For the last 12 months we have been looking at players," Gibson explained. "In the next couple of months the window is closing, the players have been told that the window is closing all the time. We are getting closer and closer to the guys that we want on the journey. In the Pakistan and Sri Lanka series we want to be focusing on a core of 17 to 18 players we will be looking at."