Veteran Bird opens up on 'most frustrating' period

Jackson Bird describes it as the most frustrating period of his decorated career.

The veteran seamer hasn't played at all this summer after injuring his Achilles tendon on the eve of what was supposed to be Tasmania's first game in late September.

But the 35-year-old – who is the leading wicket-taker across the past five Marsh Sheffield Shield seasons with 150 – admits he probably put himself in this position by being too eager to get back and play for Tassie.

But who could blame him, really.

The young and exciting Tasmanian side has pulled off a number of thrilling victories so far this summer, with a come-from-behind win over Western Australia on the last day at Blundstone Arena in the last Shield game before the KFC BBL break the icing on the cake.

They also knocked off WA in their other Shield encounter and they've also won their two Marsh One-Day Cup clashes, while their young top order of Caleb Jewell and Tim Ward have been in excellent touch with century each to start the season.

There's also 22-year-old allrounder Lawrence Neil-Smith who had taken it all before him in his 11-game first class career to date with fifties and a five-for, while young quicks Gabe Bell, 26, and Brad Hope, 22, continue to impress.

After three months on the sidelines, Bird is finally ready to return to action when the Sydney Sixers take on the Renegades tonight, and he's excited to be back in the fold as they push for their third consecutive title.

"I probably put myself in this position with this injury because I was probably a little bit too keen to get back to play for Tassie so I rushed it a little bit," Bird told cricket.com.au.

"Now I'm just taking my time because I really want to be playing at the back end of the year because we've got a good young team that's on the verge of doing something pretty special.

"To not be around to be part of that for the first half of the year, it's been pretty disappointing.

"We're in a really good position to push for some silverware and not having won anything with Tassie during my career that's something I really want to be a part of."

The right-armer said the timing of his injury couldn't have been worse as he lost all the hard work he had under his belt from a really strong pre-season.

"It's been probably the most frustrating period of my career to hurt my Achilles a couple of months ago, and then have a couple of little setbacks along the way just trying to get fit to play Sheffield Shield cricket and then hurt my leg again (at the start of November)," Bird said.

"Achilles' tendons are a pretty weird behaving injury so some days I feel really good and other days they don't – I'm just taking it sort of session-by-session and trying to progress each day.

"It was the last running session we had in the preseason. 

"We'd had a fairly heavy day of training and had a running session at the end of the day and I just had a little bit of a nick in it. 

"To be honest, I didn't really think too much of it, because I trained the rest of the week and got through it OK and then just felt it go the last session before we went away to Queensland for the first game."

Asked if it was especially frustrating given it was an Ashes summer and there was the possibility of an Australia A call-up, Bird, who has played nine Tests, said he was more disappointed to not to be playing any cricket at all.

He jokes that the only phone calls he gets from national selection panel chair George Bailey these days are for a very different reason.

"I didn't really think about (Australian selection) to be honest," Bird said. "I spoke with George a little bit and I wasn't really in the plans in terms of playing for Australia A or anything like that.

"If you look at the young bowlers that are around at the moment – Neser, Steketee, Scotty Boland is bowling as well as anyone in the country, it's good to see him get the recognition that he probably deserved over the last four or five years. 

"I feel that if they're going back to me it's a backwards step really.

"You never know, everyone might get injured, but I'm not really losing sleep over that phone call from 'Bails' – the only phone calls I get from him now are (asking) when I can play golf."

Bird said the silver lining from his injury was the realisation of the passion he still has for the game and the motivation he has to keep improving.

"A good thing that's come out of it is I probably a know where I'm at in my career, I could have quite easily not enjoyed doing the rehab and could have cut some corners here and there," he said.

"But I really miss playing and I can't wait to get back out there so it probably just shows that I'm still keen to keep getting better and keep trying to play some cricket so that's been a positive out of it.

"I can't wait (to get back out there with the Sixers), I still really love the game of cricket and I don't really want to retire just yet so I'm doing everything can to be fit when I can and obviously there's the carrot of the chance of a three-peat, so we'd be in rare company being able to do that.

"My role is to take wickets in the first couple of overs and bowl a couple of handy overs in the middle. 

"I haven't got any magic balls and I don't bowl really quick, so my strength is doing things well and not making too many costly errors."

The Sixers sit first on the BBL|11 table at the halfway mark, with the two-time defending champions having again positioned themselves as one of the teams to beat.