Picking up breaks and strains in the middle is part and parcel of the game, but there have been numerous incidents off the field as well
Andrew McGlashan23-Oct-2023Glenn Maxwell – at a partyLast year, Maxwell suffered a badly-broken leg when he slipped while running around at a friend’s 50th birthday party. It happened shortly after Australia were knocked out of the T20 World Cup and it ruled him out for the rest of the home summer. The effects of the injury and the surgery that was required are likely to be something Maxwell will need to manage for the rest of his career.Jonny Bairstow – golfMaxwell’s broken leg came not long after England’s Baristow had suffered a horrific injury when he slipped on a tee box during a round of golf. It came during a time when Bairstow was enjoying a career-best run early in the Bazball era of the 2022 season. He returned in the 2023 summer and featured in the Ashes series. “You wonder whether or not you’ll be able to walk again, jog again, run again, play cricket again,” Bairstow said. “Absolutely, those things do go through your mind.”Josh Inglis – golf (again)Shortly before the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia, Inglis was playing a round of golf when a club snapped as went for a stroke and badly cut his hand. “There was so much blood. I could see the flesh inside the wound. I was thinking there isn’t any way this isn’t a bad injury,” he said a few months later. “I was really lucky not to have suffered a major injury.”Cooper Connolly – boatingJust a couple of weeks ago, Western Australia’s Connolly saw his hopes of a Sheffield Shield debut snatched away after an accident while he was boating which led to him needing surgery on a badly damaged toe.Matthew Hayden – dog biteHealy is not the first cricketer to come a cropper courtesy of dogs. Ahead of the 2006-07 Ashes, Hayden was out for a run when he was attacked by a dog and had his ankle badly bitten.Dane van Niekerk – avocadoNeither is Healy’s incident the first time Sydney Sixers have been struck down off the cricket field. South Africa allrounder van Nierkerk missed part of the 2019-20 season after cutting her hand while preparing an avocado. “We haven’t had much luck with household accidents for the Sixers,” Healy said.
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Quinton de Kock – walking his dogsSouth Africa’s wicketkeeper missed a Test in Johannesburg against England in 2015-16 after twisting his knee when he was out walking his dogs on the eve of the match. He returned in the following game and hit 129 not out.Jimmy Adams – bread knifeWhile flying to South Africa for the 1998-99 tour, West Indies batter Adams badly cut himself with a bread knife while eating his in-flight meal and severed two tendons. He was taken to hospital as soon as he landed and was ruled out of the series which West Indies went on to lose 5-0.Jason Roy – throwing a batThe England opener suffered a facial injury after he threw his bat in frustration after being dismissed against Hampshire in 2018 and it bounced up and hit him.Mitchell Marsh and Ben Stokes – punching walls and lockersTwo allrounders together for this one. In 2014, Stokes was ruled out of the T20 World Cup after he broke his hand punching a locker after being dismissed against West Indies in Barbados. Five years later, something similar happened to Marsh when he took his anger out on a wall in the WACA changing rooms after being dismissed against Tasmania. When asked what the then Australia coach Justin Langer said, Marsh replied: “He just told me I’m an idiot basically.”Chris Lewis – sunstrokeShortly after arriving in the Caribbean on the 1993-94 tour, Lewis decided he wanted his head shaved. He then subsequently did not wear a hat during training and suffered sunstroke which ruled him out of a tour match. “The prat without a hat,” he was labeled by the Sun newspaper.
