England’s in-form fast bowler Tymal Mills has been ruled out of the remainder of T20 World Cup 2021 with a right thing strain, England Cricket Board (ECB) announced on November 3. Mills has been undergoing scans since the game against Sri Lanka where he left the field limping into his second over. The left-arm fast bowler needs minimum of three weeks rehabilitate.
England have named left-arm pacer Reece Topley as Mills replacement. Topley was in England’s reserves. The 6’7’’ bowler has played six T20Is and taken five wickets. He can extract extra bounce from the pitch and trouble the batters if he gets a chance in the side.
Mills’ unavailability may give skipper Eoin Morgan headache as he had taken seven wickets from four games in the tournament so far, including the game where he got injured and could not complete his spell.
In his absence, we may see Morgan opting for Mark Wood’s raw pace or David Willey’s left-arm fast bowling. While Wood can trouble the batters with his pace, Willey can be a dependable lower order batter adding to England’s already deep batting lineup.
Willey bowled three overs in the warm-up game against India and took the wicket of Suryakumar Yadav while conceding just 16 runs. On the other hand, Wood rushed through New Zealand’s batting lineup in the warm-up game taking four wickets for 23 runs. He bowled against India too taking the wicket of opener KL Rahul. But, he was a bit expensive against India leaking 22 runs from his two overs.
With England already in the semi-final with four wins from four games, Morgan's men will face South Africa in their next game on November 6.
