Shield game to begin despite positive COVID-19 case

The delayed New South Wales-Victoria Marsh Sheffield Shield clash will get underway Saturday at the SCG despite Will Sutherland being confirmed as COVID-19 positive.

The four-day game that was meant to begin Friday was delayed after the Victoria allrounder returned a test result requiring further analysis during routine testing.

A positive diagnosis was then confirmed later in the day.

But at this stage he is the only Victorian squad member known to have the virus, with 10 members returning negative results and a further six remaining outstanding.

None have been deemed "close contacts" of Sutherland under NSW Health guidelines, say Cricket Australia.

Should the other members of the squad return negative results, the match will get underway at 10.30am AEDT on Saturday, 24 hours later than original scheduled.

There will be five consecutive days of cricket at the venue, with CA confirming the Shield match will be a full four-day fixture and that the Marsh One-Day Cup scheduled for Wednesday would go ahead as planned.

Cricket Victoria said Sutherland, who is fully vaccinated, was displaying mild symptoms. He must quarantine for 10 days at the team hotel before returning to Melbourne.

"While it is impossible to remove all risk from this situation, Will was relatively non-infectious during his periods of interaction with members of the Victorian team," CA's chief medical officer, Dr John Orchard, said in a statement.

"As such, and due to their compliance with biosecurity protocols, all members of the Victorian squad have been deemed casual contacts. They will be able to take the field at the SCG tomorrow subject to receiving negative results."

It is the latest disruption for the two sides who have been domestic cricket's pariahs given the other four states currently have their borders shut to Victoria and NSW, leaving them to play three matches against each other before the KFC BBL break.

The Victorian team, who have won both their Shield games against the Blues this season, were forced to isolate today while further tests were carried out.

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.

It is the second time this season that the start of a Shield game has been postponed 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.

This NSW-Victoria match marks Peter Nevill's 100th Shield game for NSW, seeing 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.