England legend feels Jofra Archer might not play Test Cicket again

Jofra Archer recently suffered a stress fracture on his lower back. As a result, the pacer has been ruled out of the upcoming English Summer. Prior to this injury, Archer had been recovering from an elbow injury for some time. He has not played any competitive cricket since 2021. Thus, former England cricketer Kevin Pietersen has given his opinion on Jofra Archer, suggesting that the player may be unable to play long-form cricket again owing to another physical setback.

The 27-year-old, who last played for England in March 2021, was hoping to return to the T20 Blast for Sussex next week. In fact, he had planned to play some second-team warm-up games before the team’s season start on Thursday against Glamorgan. However, he never got a chance to take the field.

“It’s terrible news for poor Jofra Archer that he’ll miss the whole summer. He’s shown moments of brilliance for England and other teams and it’s just a horrible blow for him. It’s difficult to imagine him recovering from this to play long-form cricket again, that’s the horrible reality. Hopefully, he can still carve out a top-level white-ball career,” said Pietersen on Betway Insider.

Pietersen feels that all England bowlers tend to follow the same pattern of injuries. He believes that English bowlers are limited in their ability to make their bodies ‘bowling fit’. “His stress fracture to the back follows a pattern of these injuries being sustained by England bowlers. I do think that the number of sports scientists can complicate things far too much. When I was playing, fast bowlers used to bowl a lot of overs in the nets and got bowling fit,” he said.

“Several past fast-bowling greats went through the hard yards in their preparation and weren’t molly-coddled in between games. Curtly Ambrose, Courtney Walsh, Allan Donald, Shaun Pollock, Glenn McGrath and all the other greats weren’t told how many balls they could bowl by a sports scientist every day. They knew their bodies and got properly fit. It feels now like England’s fast bowlers can’t cope with tough, long days with the ball because they’re not used to it,” Pietersen further added.