Time for pain-free Mark Wood to bury his whites

Wrapped in cotton, a wounded Mark Wood walked out to speak following his heroics in the fourth Test against South Africa away from home. Meanwhile, back in Ashington, Northumberland, Wood’s parents and friends are waiting eagerly to listen to him talk following a marvellous performance, not his first for England.

"At least two Test matches - the Lord's Ashes Test of 2015 and the Trent Bridge South Africa Test of 2017 - hurt my career and probably took me backwards,” Wood admitted recalling back to that point in his career.  

Should he have played in the series before the third game, however, he would be a done product by now and would probably made his presence known in the medical bench. Greggy, as he addressed, had worked tremendously on him to make him fit for the fourth Test, but the question beckons: what the management want from Wood right now? Another injury?

A body as frail as a glass piece on the edge of the table, a biscuit that is just seconds dipped into a cup of tea. You know what is about to happen next, right? Exactly. With such a body, the last thing England would want to do to him is to shatter his fitness and his confidence, or whichever they can shatter first. Have we seen such injury-prone players before? Ah well, Bhuvaneshar Kumar! 

In Wood’s own words, overplaying him will take his career backwards, and where do England go from there? Well, read the sentence again. Two impressive columns for Wood when he has played with or under Joe Root, in both ODI and Test, but which one should they consider? For Chris Silverwood, only one of them will pay dividends and that is the limited-overs format. If I were you, and by you, I mean the English management, the choice would be a no-brainer, for Wood’s glorious times have come in the limited-overs format.

Oh, did I mention it? He was influential in England’s maiden World Cup victory. I don’t think it was stressed upon so much while addressing the reason for his injury. In the last two years, the gifted bowler has played exactly THREE Tests. Meanwhile, in the limited-overs format, he has played 32 games, 31 of them where he has bowled. 32 against three is kind of a stupid comparison, that is exactly where I bring in the argument that if he can play 32 in ODIs, why would the board be stupid enough to risk him for three. 

In 2019, the 30-year-old pacer was England’s leading wicket-taker with the white-ball, more wickets than his closest competitor Adil Rashid, who has 24 wickets. Jofra Archer, who was hailed by the English fans, too, falls well below his pace-compatriot Mark Wood. Very often, he has been the ‘answer’ to Eoin Morgan’s prayers, and in many ways, has been a blessing with the white ball. If you need a comparison, he is like Jasprit Bumrah to Virat Kohli and India; he is that effective. Take him away from the cruelty of Test matches, where one has to farm their way over five days and put him where it matters - with the white ball. 

On T20s, he has played only three in the last two years, picking up 6 wickets in those games. So England, if you are looking at his numbers, also look at what a fit Mark Wood can do, because if you keep playing him in the Tests, you will never get the best out of him. 

“I want to affect games of cricket for England, it would mean a hell of a lot to me. It’s something you aspire to do, affect games,” said Wood after the Test series victory over South Africa. And if you actually want to make an impact Woody, you better swap the whites, cause the Blue jersey looks good on you.