Bengaluru, March 24 (IANS) Defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru's (RCB) director of cricket Mo Bobat has said that Australian pacer Josh Hazlewood will join the squad for the upcoming season of the Indian Premier League (IPL) only after Cricket Australia is satisfied with his recovery.
Bobat also said that the franchise is closely coordinating with CA and medical teams as the fast bowler continues his return-to-play programme in Australia.
Hazlewood, who played a crucial role in RCB's triumphant campaign in the IPL 2025, has not played a match since injuring his hamstring in the Sheffield Shield last November. He also missed the recently concluded T20 World Cup 2026 due to not attaining full recovery.
The 35-year-old pacer is currently managed by Cricket Australia and is set to miss the opening matches of the IPL 2026. His return date is yet to be confirmed.
"As most people would know, Josh has missed quite a bit of cricket recently with injuries, so he's currently working through a return-to-play programme. He's doing that in Australia currently. We are liaising with both Josh and Cricket Australia, and our medical teams are collaborating very strongly on a day-to-day basis on his programme," Bobat told the media during a press conference on Tuesday.
"We'll continue to communicate with them, and as soon as he gets to a point where Cricket Australia are happy, he'll come over, and we hope to have him with us very soon,” he added.
Despite Hazlewood missing the opening matches and Yash Dayal being ruled out of the whole season due to personal reasons, Bobat believes that the team has many good bowling options and it will not be impacted.
"We have some excellent domestic fast bowlers in our squad. Rasik, who you know many of you will know, Abhinandan, who we had with us last year, and then we also signed Mangesh in this auction, so domestically we have three excellent potential options there that could replace him."
RCB will start their title defence on March 28, when they face Sunrisers Hyderabad in the tournament opener at the M.Chinnaswamy Stadium.
--IANS
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