A sickening blow to the face in the field forced bleeding South Australian Henry Hunt off the ground in Melbourne as the batting bubble quickly burst for Jake Fraser-McGurk in the one-day clash with Victoria.
Hunt was bleeding profusely from his nose after he missed catch and the ball struck him in the face, leaving Victorian batter Tom Rogers also distressed as he was attended by medical staff at the Junction Oval.
Rogers helped pilot the Vics to a jittery three-wicket victory making 67 as his team went to the top of the one-day competition table, with SA still winless.
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The opening batter also stayed with Hunt until he was a helped off the field, after which ground staff came out and scattered sawdust over the bloodied area. Hunt was sent to hospital for scans with a suspected broken nose.
The incident came as the Redbacks failed to defend a small total of 9-231, a score not helped much by boom 21-year-old Fraser-McGurk who had a reality check on his return to domestic cricket.
Two days after his ODI heroics for Australia in Canberra, and returning to the colours in which he set a new world record for the fastest-ever 50-over century last October, Fraser-McGurk lasted just eight balls, hitting one boundary, before losing his wicket.
He was caught in the covers after advancing down the wicket aggressively, as is his style, against the bowling of fellow young gun Fergus O’Neill, who was last week crowned the Bradman Young Cricketer of the Year at the Cricket Australia awards.
The reality check comes after Fraser-McGurk blasted 41 off 18 balls against the West Indies in Canberra, including 31 from a seven-ball onslaught that included three sixes, an innings that prompted Australian cricket great Ricky Ponting to declare with confidence the batting tyro could be an all-format star for Australia, including at Test level.
Ponting compared Fraser-McGurk to batting great David Warner, who arrived on the scene as a white-ball star before going on to make more than 8000 Test runs as an opening batter.
Ponting backs JFM for AUS test selection | 01:44
“(Fraser-McGurk) is someone that can be well and truly fast-tracked through the Australian system,” Ponting said on Wednesday
“When we saw (Warner) at the start everyone doubted whether he’s going to be good enough to play Test cricket, technically.
“But with the talent and the skill that (Warner) had – Jake has got as much talent as David had come coming through … the earlier they can get him into the system (the better).
“Get him playing and letting him work out for himself the best way to have success in all the different formats.
“When you’ve got that sort of talent, you need to be exposed to cricket at the highest level to work it out. Jake can do that.”
Fraser-McGurk blasted a 29-ball century for SA in the domestic 50-over competition late last year before a breakout Big Bash landed him a national call-up.
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