Delhi Capitals will be without the services of allrounder Mitchell Marsh for the remainder of the season as the Australian will not return to India. The all-rounder will continue his recovery from a right hamstring niggle back home, head coach Ricky Ponting informed on Monday (Apr 22). 

Marsh had flown to Australia on April 12 to consult Cricket Australia’s medical staff and was scheduled to return for the franchise. However, according to Ponting, the rehab might take a little bit longer. 

“I don’t think he’ll be coming back. There’s a certain cut off point with replacement players. Cricket Australia were keen to have him at home to start his recovery process and we sent him back as soon as we could,” Ponting told reporters. 

The former Australian player-turned-coach said Marsh’s availability for the upcoming World Cup will not be a concern for the defending champions. 

“They’ve been managing his rehab for a couple of weeks now. I spoke to him the other day and it seems it’s taken a little longer than he first thought to get over it. I don’t think the T20 World Cup would be an issue.”

Up until the niggle ruled him out, Marsh featured in only four matches for DC, scoring 61 in three innings with a high score of 23. He also picked just one wicket while rolling his arms. 

Notably, this is not the first instance when Marsh has left DC in the lurch due to his injury woes. Last year, DC lost Marsh’s services midway through the tournament when he pulled out after playing nine games.

DC are currently languishing eighth on the points table with only three wins out of eight. The team led by Rishabh Pant needs to string together a series of wins from hereon to stand a chance of making it to the playoffs. 

Prithvi Shaw, Jake Fraser-McGurk, Abishek Porel, Shai Hope, Rishabh Pant(w/c), Sumit Kumar, Tristan Stubbs, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Mukesh Kumar, Ishant Sharma, Khaleel Ahmed, Kumar Kushagra, Praveen Dubey, Lalit Yadav, Lizaad Williams, David Warner, Jhye Richardson, Anrich Nortje, Yash Dhull, Ricky Bhui, Rasikh Dar Salam, Vicky Ostwal, Swastik Chikara.