Andy Flower, the England team director, has revealed that Tim Bresnan is the most serious of their lengthy injury list ahead of the World Cup. Bresnan suffered a calf injury during the second one-day international at Hobart and is one of five players to have flown home early from Australia with the most recent being Paul Collingwood.
England's casualty list also includes Graeme Swann (back), Ajmal Shahzad (hamstring) and Chris Tremlett (side). The latter isn't part of the World Cup 15 but is a possible replacement should anyone not recover. "Probably it's Bresnan considering the sight of his injury, just above his Achilles tendon in his lower calf," Flower said when pushed on who was struggling the most. "But he's not a man who has suffered injuries, well not many injuries, in the past and hopefully he will recover very quickly and be ready somewhere near the start."
England have been left battling to have a full-strength squad to take to the subcontinent later this month and it could be especially tight for the two warm-up matches against Canada and Pakistan. Collingwood, who suffered a back spasm at Sydney and flew out of Perth on Thursday evening, has been given paternity leave during the warm-up period along with Swann leaving the prospect of England not having 11 fit players when they arrive in Bangladesh.
"Of course the timing of them getting back to full fitness is important for the start of the World Cup," Flower said. "We can't be absolutely certain of that at this stage but we are monitoring them on a daily basis."
Despite the rush to get Collingwood back to the UK with just four days of this tour remaining Flower wasn't overly concerned about the allrounder. He was unable to bowl at Sydney as England failed to defend a record total of 333 having hurt his back playing the final shot of the innings. Collingwood's mixture of medium-pacers and cutters are set to be important to England's World Cup although he continues to struggle for runs.
"He should be alright. He's been sent home to get looked after back in England by the specialists, his lower back needs a scan and the right sort of treatment," Flower said. "The sooner he got home the better, he wouldn't have been available for this last game anyway. He's going to a very important member of our World Cup side so we needed to get him off home early."
With the bowling ranks currently so depleted England could reach the point next week where they have to replace players in their final 15. Having stayed fit during the series, and taken 6 for 45 at Brisbane, Chris Woakes has made a strong case to be a first reserve as he also provides some useful lower-order batting.
Steven Finn has been given his one-day international debut during this series having not originally been part of the squad until James Anderson was rested for the first three matches. He was England's most impressive seamer in Sydney, taking 2 for 51 from his 10 overs in a high-scoring encounter. Liam Plunkett, the Durham pace bowler, has also been called into the squad for the final match in Perth and arrived on Wednesday after a 40-hour journey from the Caribbean where he was part of the England Lions squad.
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