Steve Smith undergoes elbow surgery successfully; comeback date still uncertain

Lady Luck is yet to smile on Steve Smith, the former Australian captain who came under a year-long ban in the wake of the ball-tampering scandal in South Africa in March last year. The 29-year-old batsman, one of the most prolific scorers of the game in the modern times, got injured just when he was approaching the end of his ban tenure and there is no clarity over when he will return to competitive cricket.

On Monday, Smith underwent surgery for his elbow injury and will have his right elbow in a brace for six weeks now. It will only be after that that Cricket Australia will know the state of his fitness and decide on a date of return. The New South Wales cricketer has already been ruled out of the ongoing Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) where he suffered the injury and the upcoming Pakistan Super League (PSL). His suspension ends on March 29.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the exact date of his comeback is still not known. The deadline for announcing the squads for the ICC World Cup starting on May 30 is April 23 and Smith will not have played at any level for three months prior to that.

Will be difficult for Australia to ignore Smith, even if injured

It is less likely that the Kangaroos will overlook Steve Smith for their World Cup squad, given his track record but it will be a difficult task to bet on the batsman when Australia begin their campaign to defend the World title won in 2015.

Smith has played 64 Tests, 108 ODIs and 30 T20Is since making international debut in 2010 and has scored over 10,000 runs with 31 centuries. He started his career as a leg-break bowler and lower-order batsman but over the time, he made massive improvements in his batting to become one of Australia’s best scorers in the recent times.

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