Jofra Archer made his return to bowling in England colours today, September 12, as he continued his recovery from an elbow injury that has kept out of action since this year’s Indian Premier League.

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A recurrence of a stress fracture to his right elbow ruled Jofra Archer out of the entirety of the 2023 English summer. He has been plagued by a succession of injuries for a number of years, ever since damaging his right elbow during the 2019/20 winter. Injuries have prevented England’s 2019 World Cup final Super Over hero from playing a single home international since 2020.

That right elbow injury meant that Archer missed out on selection in England’s preliminary 2023 World Cup squad though he could still travel to India as a travelling reserve.

At the time of the squad announcement, England selector Luke Wright said: “I don’t think we can, unfortunately, have him in the squad to start with. Best-case scenario for Jof really at the moment would probably be [that he is] available for the back-end of the tournament. That’s best-case scenario, which obviously, in a squad of 15, is going to leave us quite light.

“The last thing we want to do is really to put a massive time [limit] on him and try to push him and force him into playing before he does [feel ready]. We’ve got to get him right, first and foremost.

“But is there an opportunity or a place where potentially he could play at the back-end of a tournament, if all things go well and there was an injury? Yes, there’s a potential chance. But obviously, a lot of things have still got to go right with this rehab before then.”

England would have been encouraged to see Archer bowl at somewhere close to 100 percent in a training session on the eve of their third ODI against New Zealand. He bowled with good pace in front of director of cricket Rob Key, with new assistant coach Andrew Flintoff manning the mitt.

Wright’s hope that Archer may be fit enough to play a part towards the back-end of the World Cup may come to fruition, though if Archer is only named as a travelling reserve, it would require to an injury to a player in the initial 15-man squad for Archer to come in.

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