Victorian coach Chris Rogers has revealed Will Pucovski suffered dizziness when he returned to training after suffering a head knock in Adelaide and he’s been ruled out of the Sheffield Shield clash starting on Saturday.
Pucovski was forced to retire hurt, before returning to the crease, when he was hit on the helmet batting for the Victorian Second XI last week.
He passed a concussion test but was withdrawn from the final day of the match as a precaution and to give him the best chance to be ready for the resumption of the Shield season.
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But some “minor” symptoms lingered and Rogers said the decision was made to sideline Pucovski again, another setback in what has been a long battle with concussion and mental health-related issues since his Test debut in 2021.
“He’s unavailable, he experienced some delayed (concussion) symptoms after getting hit in the helmet in the Second XI game in Adelaide last week,” Rogers said on Thursday.
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“There were only minor symptoms, but I think everyone here at Cricket Victoria is making sure that we’re doing the right thing and being conservative with our approach.
“Usually, it’s probably a seven-day approach for recovery for most people, but for Will, we’ve pushed it out to 12.
“This game is just a little bit tight, but there are still some good signs … the kind of long-term thinking is that (he’ll be OK) but he obviously still has a few symptoms.
“We want to make sure we’re doing the right thing by him.”
Rogers, who was at the Second XI game when Pucovski was struck, said the positive signs of Pucovski batting on in Adelaide didn’t mean there wouldn’t be lingering effects given his history with head knocks.
“I was there, it’s always a concern when he gets hit in a helmet,” Rogers told SEN.
“Nic Maddinson was batting with him and Nick said to me later that Will was desperate to stay out there. He was keen to keep going and we haven’t really seen that before, so that was the real positive.
“After that, he came off, he just said he felt OK, he went out and had a hit in the nets and said he was ready to go.
“Everything seems pretty good … but when he got back home, there were a few fitness sessions where there was just a little bit of dizziness.
“The medical team have decided to take a conservative approach with it and we support that.”
The latest setback comes after Pucovski signed his first deal to play county cricket in the UK with Leicestershire.
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Rogers remains confident that Pucovski will get back to cricket and continue to push for a return to the Test side.
“They’re all steps in the right direction,” he said.
“He put together four Shield games in a row in the first half and he hadn’t done that for a long time.
“Even that’s positive wanting to go and play cricket in the UK because it’s not just about the concussions, it’s a little bit around the OCD that he experiences around cricket.
“These are all things that they’re just building nicely and if you can string together a number of games, it almost feels like there’s that spot for Australia available at some stage, maybe even Usman (Khawaja) retires.”
