England bring in Jake Ball in place of Chris Woakes for series against Australia

Woakes was ruled out for the upcoming limited-overs series against Australia after he suffered a right quad strain during the last week’s series-levelling Test win over Pakistan. Woakes was already ruled out of the one-off ODI against Scotland on June 10 as well and will join all-rounder Ben Stokes on the sidelines, who is also recovering from a hamstring tear.

“Both players have commenced their injury rehab programmes and will be hoping to respond to treatment with the aim of featuring in the latter stages of the series,” the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) announced on Tuesday.

In the aftermath of Woakes’ injury, 27-year old English pacer Jake Ball was called up to the squad as a replacement. Ball last played for England in their 4-1 ODI series win Against Australia earlier this year. Ball made a name for himself while playing for Nottinghamshire in the English County Championship since 2009 and received his first call-up to the national team in 2016 in a Test match against Pakistan.

England will look to prepare themselves for the series against India in July when they go up against Australia in this month’s ODI series. This will be the first time that the Australian team will play international cricket without the likes of skipper Steven Smith and David Warner, who are on a one-year ban due to their involvement in the sandpaper-gate incident in the Test series against South Africa. This will also be Australian coach Justin Langer’s first series in charge of the Australian cricket team.