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Cricket World Cup: Gabba washout delays Clarke's Australia return | |
(4 months later) | |
Australia captain Michael Clarke will have to wait another week before he can join the World Cup party after steady rain washed out the hosts’ Pool A match against Bangladesh at the Gabba on Saturday. | |
Cylone Marcia brought torrential rain to the Brisbane area, where locals have been advised to stock up on supplies, and the persistent downpour snuffed out any hope of even playing a minimum requirement 20-overs-a-side contest. | |
“AUSvBAN is officially abandoned with incessant rain making any play impossible”, the International Cricket Council (ICC) said on its Twitter feed. | |
The teams were awarded a point each, something Bangladesh, who thumped Afghanistan in their tournament opener but were huge underdogs against the hosts, will welcome more than Australia. | |
However, nobody would have been be wanting the match to go ahead more than Clarke, who missed Australia’s 111-run drubbing of England last weekend and has only played a warm-up against the UAE since sustaining a hamstring injury last December. | |
The Bangladesh fixture was the deadline issued by selectors for the batsman to prove his fitness and Clarke told the pre-match news conference he was raring to go. | |
“I’ll put a lot of faith in my preparation and the work that I’ve done over the last eight-and-a-half weeks and I’m really confident that I’m a hundred percent fit to walk out on that field and help the team have success”, he said. | |
Clarke will now hope to play his first match of the tournament against co-hosts New Zealand in Auckland next Saturday. | |
Bangladesh head to Melbourne for their next match against Sri Lanka on Thursday. |