Andrew McDonald to miss start of Sri Lanka tour with Covid-19 – ESPNcricinfo

Australia head coach Andrew McDonald has tested positive for Covid-19 and will miss the opening week of the Sri Lanka tour.

McDonald was unable to fly out as scheduled and will isolate for seven days before joining up with the squad. He is expected to be with the side before the second T20I on June 8.

Assistant coach Michael Di Venuto will take charge of the squad for the early days of the trip. Spin coach S Sriram and former Australia quick Clint McKay are also part of the backroom staff for the T20I and ODI series.

This will be McDonald’s first tour since being appointed full-time into the head coach role after he took over from Justin Langer in an interim capacity earlier in the year which included the tour of Pakistan.

Newly appointed assistant coaches Daniel Vettori and Andre Borovec will then work alongside McDonald during the two-Test series. Borovec will also coach the Australia A portion of the tour which includes two one-day games and two four-day matches.

Ben Sawyer, the assistant coach with the Australia women’s team, had been due to be part of the A-team coaching staff but he is expected to be confirmed as the new head coach of the New Zealand women’s set-up in the coming days.

The latter stages of Australia’s tour of Pakistan were hit by Covid-19 when Ashton Agar, Josh Inglis and physio Brendan Wilson tested positive during the white-ball leg.

The first T20I against Sri Lanka takes place on June 7 with the opening two games back-to-back in Colombo before the tour moves to Pallekele.

The Australia T20I squad, which is missing Pat Cummins (rested) and Adam Zampa (paternity leave) from its first-choice players, will gather in Colombo on Thursday.

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