Jofra Archer To Be Ruled Out Of T20 World Cup 2024? England Cricket Provides Humongous Update

English cricket team director Rob Key has provided a major update on the return of right-arm pacer Jofra Archer who has been out of action since the summer of 2023. He has been sidelined due to a recurring elbow injury which also saw him miss out on the ICC Cricket World Cup in India last year.

Jofra Archer was a key member of the England team that won its maiden 50-over World Cup trophy in 2019. He finished the tournament as England’s best bowler with 20 wickets in the tournament and also finished as the 3rd highest wicket-taker after Australia’s Mitchell Starc and New Zealand’s Lockie Ferguson who collected 27 and 21 wickets respectively.

Archer’s exclusion from the English World Cup side saw the Three Lions bow out of the competition from the league stages itself and at one point their chances of securing direct qualification for the Champions Trophy in 2025 had looked bleak before they eventually finished 7th with 6 points in 9 games, above Bangladesh, Sri-Lanka, and Netherlands.

After failing to perform like defending champions in the tournament last year, England’s next assignment in terms of ICC events is the T20 World Cup in June, a 20-team event in which they will again arrive as reigning champions. Under Jos Buttler’s captaincy, England won the 2022 T20 WC in Australia comprehensively, losing just 1 match throughout.

If they want to retain the title and take inspiration from their CWC performance last October then Jofra Archer becomes a very important player for them. And England’s team director Rob Key in a recent interview, claimed that they are slowly building up Archer for the mega event in USA and West Indies.

Key stated that Archer was looking in good shape during England’s recent tour to the West Indies, where he was bowling as if nothing had happened to his elbow.

“Our plan is the T20 World Cup, building him up slowly. I saw him bowl in the Caribbean and it was like he’d never been away. I don’t want to get back to this thing where he plays and then goes down again.” – Rob Key said.

Jofra Archer who switched allegiance to English cricket in 2019 has collected 42 wickets each in ODIs and T20Is by playing just 21 and 13 matches respectively. In T20 cricket, Archer has 18 wickets in 15 games with a decent economy rate of less than 8.

Rob Key Reveals Jofra Archer Wanted To Play IPL This Year

In the same interview, Rob Key revealed that the English management is treating his recovery very cautiously and is not willing to rush anything at the moment even if it requires him to miss this year’s IPL which could have been key to his build-up to the T20 world cup in June.

It was while playing in the IPL last year that Jofra Archer got injured again and could not stage his comeback for the World Cup which cost England badly.  

“He wanted to play in the IPL but we said not this time. Hopefully, the years he has missed he can add to the end of his career. He is such a great talent.” – Rob Key concluded.