England hit by another injury scare as Jake Ball limps off in Adelaide

09 November 2017 05:54

England were hit by another injury scare when Jake Ball's right ankle appeared to buckle in his delivery stride at the Adelaide Oval.

First-change Ball was bowling round the wicket as he fell to the ground, and was unable to resume, in his fifth over - walking gingerly off the pitch for further treatment from England physio Craig de Weymarn.

The incident comes just two days after Ball's fellow seamer Steven Finn had to leave this Ashes tour with a knee cartilage injury to be replaced by the uncapped Tom Curran.

Ball's misfortune interrupted England's useful progress in the first session, as Cricket Australia struggled to 41 for two from 22 overs in reply to 293 all out.

The tourists had earlier lost their ninth and 10th wickets for 15 runs in 25 minutes of play, completing a sequence of five for the addition of 22 which began the previous evening.

England could therefore at least set about making their own inroads with the ball.

Chris Woakes, and James Anderson especially, allowed precious few scoring opportunities - and survival was very much the limit of Nick Larkin and Jake Carder's ambition at the top of the order for CA.

They managed it for almost 10 overs, before Larkin fell lbw pushing forward to Woakes for just six runs from 32 balls.

A double-change brought Ball and Craig Overton into the attack, but minimal respite until Carder timed the Somerset seamer off his legs in the 16th over for a rare boundary.

Shortly afterwards Ryan Gibson went after a full delivery from Ball and was well-caught by a diving Dawid Malan at third slip.

But Ball was out of action two overs later.

Source: PA