I'm ready to play at Lord's: Cummins

It's three years, seven months and a handful of weeks since Pat Cummins walked off the field in his most recent Test match, and collected a man of the match trophy on his way back to a victorious Australia dressing room.

It was also his Test debut.

And he’s not played one since.

In fact, his previous first-class appearance in white clothes bowling with a red ball was – like his one and only Test – in South Africa two years ago, such has been the fractured nature of a career that burned as brightly as a strip of magnesium ribbon before being just as quickly snuffed out by injury.

But having been added to Australia’s Ashes squad last week when chronic knee problems forced Ryan Harris into retirement, and with Mitchell Starc under a cloud with pain in the back of his right ankle, Cummins has arrived in the UK announcing he’s ready to play in this week’s Lord’s Test if needed.

Quick Single: Cummins' two-day turnaround

"I think so," Cummins said when asked if he was good to go in Cardiff today, less than a week after arriving from Australia where he was preparing to tour India with an Australia A team before he received an urgent call from National Selection Panel chair Rod Marsh to change to his itinerary.

"I haven’t played a lot of red ball cricket in the last little while, but I’ve still played a lot of T20s and one-dayers and been bowling a lot, so in terms of my body I feel 100 per cent confident.

"In the last month or so I’ve been bowling with the red ball trying to rediscover swing and all those things that come with a first-class match and I’ve been really happy with where I am.

"So I haven’t put it into a game yet but if a game comes up soon I feel pretty confident."

Issues for Australia to overcome ahead of Lord's Test

It's a confidence that is well placed seeing that when he made that memorable start – and temporary finish – to his Test career in Johannesburg he had come comparatively cold into the game having not been involved in a red-ball match for a significant period beforehand.

"Back then, I hadn't played a first-class game for about six months and certainly the few days leading in (to his first Test) I was really nervous," Cummins recalled.

"I didn't know whether I was going to swing the ball and things like that. 

"But when I played I kind of surprised myself."

The immediate likelihood of Cummins being rushed into an Australia XI that could be re-cast in the wake of their 169-run loss to England in the opening Ashes Test has lessened with Starc’s ankle problem showing "signigicant improvement", according to Bupa Support Team physiotherapist Alex Kountouris.

Quick Single: Australia boosted by Starc update

But given that Australia have suffered two fast-bowling casualties in less than a week with a further month and a half of their Ashes campaign to run, it would be a bold gamble to bet against Cummins resuming his truncated Test career sometime in the next four matches.

No sooner had he announced himself to the cricket world by claiming 6-79 in the second innings against the Proteas and bowling Australia to a famous win, Cummins has battled a series of stress injuries to his back, his feet and his ribs.

Several aborted comebacks led to Cricket Australia mapping out a detailed, closely scrutinised program designed to have him ready for this year’s World Cup campaign, in which Cummins played an early part before losing his place in the final XI to fellow NSW quick Josh Hazlewood. 

However, since that tournament ended in March, Cummins maintained a regular bowling program with his Indian Premier League franchise the Kolkata Knight Riders and has further increased his red-ball workloads at the Bupa National Cricket Centre in Brisbane over the past month or more.

Cummins testing himself with red ball

"It (his injury-wracked body) really feels good,” he said.

"The last four or five weeks up in Brisbane I have been bowling quite a bit - three or four times a week and I haven’t had any issues, so I feel really confident."

And while a call-up for the second Test at Lord’s starting on Thursday would seemingly depend on deepening injury woes and an unexpectedly green pitch at the Home of Cricket, Cummins will fine tune his game over coming days and be ready for the subsequent tour match against Derbyshire.

From where he can push for a place in the final three Tests in Birmingham, Nottingham and at The Oval in London.

"They (the selectors) have certainly flagged that tour game for me," Cummins said today.

"If anything does happen, we've got Peter Siddle bowling really well and I'm sure he's ready to jump in at any chance. 

"I'm just happy to be over here."

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