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Hurricanes 'run out of bowlers' as COVID, injuries bite

Hobrat reduced to just two frontline bowlers in their heavy defeat to the Strikers in Adelaide

Speedster Riley Meredith has suffered a mystery injury that limited him to only one over in the Hobart Hurricanes' seven-wicket KFC BBL loss to the Adelaide Strikers on Wednesday, short-changing his side's already threadbare attack.

The Hurricanes remained tight-lipped on the nature of Meredith's injury but are hopeful he will be available for their next game against Brisbane Heat at the Gabba, scheduled for Saturday.

"I'm not going to reveal (what the injury was) because I don't know if I can," Hurricanes captain Matthew Wade said after Wednesday's match.

"He felt a little sore in the warm-up, so we let him bowl one over to try to get the breakthroughs early in the first six overs.

"It didn't pan out that way, (and) he was going off.

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"We don't think it's a long-term injury but if he pushed through and did something long-term, we're pretty thin on fast bowlers at the moment, so we took the cautionary role in this game.

"We're really hopeful he'll play the next game."

With Meredith on ice, Joel Paris and Nathan Ellis out with injury, Scott Boland with Australia's Test side and leg-spinner Will Parker subbed out of the match, Tom Rogers and Sandeep Lamichhane were the Hurricanes' only two specialist bowlers as the Strikers cruised to victory.

The Canes also went into the game without fast-bowling allrounder Josh Kann, who has tested positive to COVID-19, while English imports Harry Brooks and Jordan Thompson also missed out as close contacts of Kann.

"We kind of looked after him (Meredith) and we ran out of bowlers to be honest in the end," Wade said.

"We only had two of our frontline bowlers and we were making the rest up with our allrounders.

"We're starting to get thin on players."

Wade revealed off-field restrictions have further tightened on players this week as COVID-19 infections continue to rise, with the Adelaide Strikers and Sydney Sixers the only clubs yet to report a positive test result.

"Restrictions are certainly tightening up within Cricket Australia," he said. "They've hammered down on restrictions again over the last 24 hours.

"There's not going to be much to do outside the hotel again.

"The bigger issue at the moment is that we've got COVID within the teams and we've been playing each other.

"It's starting to get tricky, this tournament ... we'll try to keep the train on the tracks, but if it can't be done, it can't be done."