Shield game delayed due to possible COVID case

The scheduled Marsh Sheffield Shield game at the SCG won't begin this morning as planned as medicos take a closer look at a COVID-19 test result of allrounder Will Sutherland.

During routine testing, Cricket Australia says Sutherland "returned a test result which requires further analysis" and that the start of the game had been delayed.

The Victorian team is isolating while further tests are carried out and Sutherland's result is re-analysed.

No members of Australia's Ashes squad were due to play in the match, with those this week picked for national duty already in Queensland ahead of the first Vodafone Test in Brisbane.

The results of further testing will determine whether the match can begin tomorrow, or if it will be postponed to a later date.

A further update is expected later on Friday afternoon.

Sutherland had played in the past two Shield matches between the sides in the past four weeks, with Victoria winning both.

"The Marsh Sheffield Shield match between New South Wales and Victoria at the Sydney Cricket Ground, scheduled to begin today, has been postponed due to a possible COVID-19 case in the Victorian side," Cricket Australia said in a statement, just 30 minutes before the scheduled coin toss.

"In the course of routine COVID-19 testing, Will Sutherland has returned a test result which requires further analysis. The Victorian team is currently self-isolating while this analysis and investigation takes place.

"Cricket Australia will provide further updates in due course."

In July, Australia's ODI against the West Indies in Barbados was postponed on the morning of the match due to a positive test result in the home team's camp.

However, the match was played the following day without incident after all other players and staff returned negative results in re-testing.

It's the second time this season that the start of a Shield game has been scrapped on the morning of the match. A game between Queensland and Tasmania in September was called off after cases of community transmission were confirmed in Brisbane, sparking fears that the Tigers squad would not be able to return home due to a border closure.

The news of the possible positive case came little more than an hour prior to what would have been the start of Peter Nevill's 100th Shield game for NSW, which would see him become just the fourth man to achieve the feat.

It was also to be the first match since the introduction of the Hodge-Matthews Trophy, a perpetual trophy named after past greats Brad Hodge and Greg Matthews, which the two sides will play for whenever they meet in the Shield.