Jofra Archer will be available for the Mumbai Indians for the entire IPL 2023 season: Reports
There was a lot of talk about whether England speedster Jofra Archer will leave IPL 2023 early, with The Ashes and the World Cup to be played later this year. However, Cricbuzz has now reported that Archer will be available for the Mumbai Indians (MI) for all their games in the IPL 2023 season.
Archer was out of action with multiple injuries for almost 18 months and made his comeback to competitive cricket in January 2023 for MI Cape Town in the SA20 league.
Despite learning about his unavailability last season, Mumbai still went ahead and shelled out INR 8 crore for Archer's services.
While they wanted to unite Jofra Archer and Jasprit Bumrah and bowl them in tandem in IPL 2023, it now seems unlikely. Bumrah is likely to miss the upcoming season due to his back injury, as per an earlier report by Cricbuzz.
Here's what the officials from the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and the IPL told Cricbuzz about Jofra Archer:
"He should be able to play a full part in the IPL and as always, his franchise and the ECB will manage his workload."
According to the report, the workload of the speedster will be monitored by the ECB with cooperation from the IPL franchise.
Jofra Archer is currently representing England against Bangladesh
Archer featured for England in the ODI series against South Africa earlier in the year and picked up a six-wicket haul in one of the games. He is currently playing in the ODI series against Bangladesh, where he produced figures of 2/37 in the first game.
MI dearly need Archer to step up in Bumrah's absence and it will be interesting to see how he is used in different situations. There's also a doubt in the minds of many about whether he is the same bowler after his return from injury, something only time will tell.