Glenn Maxwell showed off the extent of his all-round capabilities by donning the gloves in an Australia training session after regular wicketkeeper Matthew Wade tested positive for Covid-19, putting his participation for Australia’s crunch game against England this Friday in doubt.

Wade is the second Australia player to test positive for Covid-19 in recent days after Adam Zampa contracted the virus and had to sit-out Australia’s victory over Sri Lanka. However, Wade is still expected to play on Friday as the T20 World Cup rules do not preclude the participation of players who return positive Covid-19 tests.

Australia do not have a spare specialist wicketkeeper within their squad after Josh Inglis, who was initially named in Australia’s 15-man squad for the tournament, was replaced by all-rounder Cameron Green. Inglis suffered a freak hand injury while playing golf in the build up to the tournament. Australia can only call up a wicketkeeper to the squad to permanently replace a current squad member for the remainder of the World Cup – if one was called up to replace Wade in the squad now, Wade would be unable to play later in the competition.

With the possibility of Australia requiring stand-in wicketkeeper for the England game, Maxwell put on the gloves with a view to carrying out the role if required. It is a job he has performed before for Australia, doing so during Misbah-ul-Haq’s 56-ball Test hundred at Abu Dhabi in 2014.

Maxwell isn’t the only emergency wicketkeeping contender available to Australia within their squad. David Warner has also kept wicket in Test cricket, having done so in the same Test as Maxwell back in 2014.

You can watch Maxwell taking the gloves in training below:

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