Green flew home from the UK after complaining of back pain following the third ODI against England at Chester-le-Street. He has been tested in England and Australia on his return but CA’s medical team have taken time to assess his progress with no formal plan yet.
Green, 25, has suffered four stress fractures but has been out since 2019 and has been carefully managed in his first four years in international cricket.
If surgery is decided as an option, it will take him out all summer. Assuming a non-surgical recovery, it is possible he could still play cricket this summer as a batsman only, but a timetable for his availability is yet to be determined.
If Green is unavailable, and Smith moves up to four, it opens the door for an opener to be taken in Shield cricket with Marcus Harris, Cameron Bancroft and Matt Renshaw all in the running as they were last summer before Smith laid down his hand to open. .
Harris made a fine start to the Shield season scoring 143 for Victoria against Tasmania, but it came to a bittersweet end at the Junction Oval when Tasmanian allrounder Beau Webster also scored a century. Bancroft and Renshaw both made low scores in the first innings of the match between Western Australia and Queensland at the WACA ground.
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