Michael Clarke is hoping to recover from a hamstring injury in time to lead Australia against Zimbabwe in today’s triangular series clash in Harare.
Clarke missed Australia’s first two games of the competition, in which they have beaten Zimbabwe by 198 runs and lost to South Africa by seven wickets, after picking up the injury during a training session.
However, having spent a significant part of the past week in the team room receiving treatment, Clarke could return for the second round of triangular fixtures.
“I hope so,” he said. “But there’s no point getting on the park just to play a game when we’ve got 13 other guys here that really want to play and are 100 per cent fit to play.
“So I don’t want to do the wrong thing by the team and my teammates, but if I pull up okay then I’m 100 per cent fit to perform.”
Should Clarke come through Australia’s final training session unscathed, Australia will need to shuffle their pack, with offspinner Nathan Lyon also likely to return after he was surprisingly left out of the defeat to South Africa.
While South Africa legspinner Imran Tahir returned figures of 2 for 45, Australia went into the match without a specialist spinner and failed to defend a target of 328.
“The wicket has been pretty low, pretty slow and pretty flat so we need to find ways to take wickets,” Clarke said. Fast bowler Mitchell Johnson could be rested for today’s clash to make space for Lyon.
Zimbabwe must win the game to stay in with a realistic chance of making Saturday’s final after both Australia and South Africa recorded bonus point wins against them in the first round.