Pat Cummins hopes to play “back half plus the finals” of IPL 2026
Pat Cummins is expecting to recover from his injury and play the “back half” of the IPL 2026. Cummins has arrived in India and participated in the warm-up session at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Wednesday. Cummins who has played only one competitive match-the third Asesh Test- since his back injury last July, was ruled out of the T20 World Cup as well.
“I’m still recovering from a back injury, but it’s good. I’m back bowling in the nets. The IPL is starting soon. I won’t make the start of that, but it shouldn’t be too long before I’m back out there playing.” Cummins further added, “I’m back bowling. I’m bowling basically every third day at the moment. We’ve mapped out a plan to get me right by [the] middle of the tournament, so hopefully, if nothing goes wrong, [I’ll] play the back half plus the finals.”
In absence of Cummins, Ishan Kishan is going to lead Sunrisers Hyderabad in the first half of the IPL 2026. Speaking of the same, Cummins remarked, “Ishan’s had a really successful captaincy stint with his local side in the last year or so.”
Prithvi Shaw set for fresh start with Delhi Capitals in IPL 2026
After remaining unsold at the IPL 2025 auction, Prithvi Shaw is back with Delhi Capitals. Ahead of the IPL 2026, Shaw claimed that the break helped him get rejuvenated. “I enjoyed my life a lot. I went to a couple of destinations to refresh my mind a little. Then I came back [and followed] the same routine: I practised, worked hard. Whether it was training or batting, what I used to do, I started doing three times. And I think it was a good break for me. I can’t say that I took a step back. I needed that break to make myself mentally strong.”
He added, “I am a human being; I will make mistakes,” Shaw said. “Obviously, whatever is written or spoken out there, they know only half of it. My family knows me… My friends know in and out about me. In social media or in the papers, whenever good or bad things used to come [about me], I was very young [to understand them], obviously. Everytime you see [such stuff], you come [back for more]. So I stopped seeing them.”
NZC conducts former allrounders into Hall of Fame
Former allrounders Jeremy Coney and Hidee Tiffen have bene inducted into the New Zealand Cricket Hall of Fame. Coney played 52 Tests and scored 2668 runs including 15 fifties and three centuries and took 27 wickets. Coney also played 88 ODIs where he scored 1874 runs at 30.72 Coney speaking of his playing days, said, “I think back to the skinny wraith from Ngaio in Wellington, spending his primary schoolboy afternoons alone on our tennis court immersed with a ball, my older brother’s bat.”
He added, “”In that wash-house I first heard the seductive clink of buckles from pads… It was on this tennis court, using this borrowed equipment I created unlikely and (as yet) unregistered Test victories over England and Australia. One might imagine the pleasure supplied when these mythical encounters became a reality for me”.
Tiffen, on the other hand, is one of the best women cricketers New Zealand has ever produced. After debuting as a 19-year-old she went on to play 117 ODIs scoring 2919 runs at 30.72 with 18 fifties and a century and picked up 49 wickets with her medium pace. She also played two Tests and nine T20Is and coached the New Zealand women after her retirement in 2009.
“It’s a huge honour to be inducted into the Hall of Fame and to be alongside some of my role models already inducted, like Debbie Hockley, Sir Richard Hadlee and Emily Drumm,” she said. “As a young girl from Timaru, representing New Zealand was always a dream.”
