Australia vs West Indies: Usman Khawaja retires hurt after being hit by bouncer
- Published
First Test, Adelaide |
West Indies 188 (McKenzie 50) & 120 (Hazlewood 5-35) |
Australia 283 (Head 119) & 26-0 |
Australia won by 10 wickets |
Australia opener Usman Khawaja retired injured after being hit by a bouncer but his side beat West Indies by 10 wickets in the first Test in Adelaide.
Khawaja, 37, misjudged a short ball from Shamar Joseph and was hit on the chin and after treatment retired with Australia one run away from victory.
He was shown spitting blood but a scan has cleared Khawaja of any jaw damage.
He passed an initial concussion test but will be checked on Saturday to assess his fitness for the second Test.
That is a day-night game in Brisbane and starts on 25 January.
Khawaja posted on Instagram, saying: "Thanks for all the well wishes. I'm fine, just wanted Marnus to have a hit!"
West Indies were 95 runs behind after the first innings, despite fighting back with the ball and bowling Australia out for 283.
They started day three on 73-6, still 22 runs behind, and were soon reduced to 94-9 with Joshua da Silva and Alzarri Joseph removed by Mitchell Starc, before Josh Hazlewood claimed Gudakesh Motie to take career-best match figures of 9-79.
Debutant Shamar Joseph, who dismissed Steve Smith his first ball, added 15, to go with his first-innings 36, before being stumped off the bowling of Nathan Lyon.
It left Australia needing 26 to win and the scores were level when Khawaja was hit by Joseph.
Marnus Labuschagne came to the middle when Khawaja retired and hit the winning run off his second ball.
If Khawaja is unavailable for the second Test, it is likely to mean an opportunity for Matt Renshaw.
He was with the Australia squad for this game, in case they needed a concussion replacement, and averages 29.3 in his 14 Tests.
Cameron Bancroft is another option, but was left out of the squad for the first Test after the retirement of opener David Warner.
That was despite being the highest run-scorer in the past two seasons of the Sheffield Shield, leading to Australia captain Pat Cummins explaining that Bancroft's non-selection, external was purely down to wanting to pick the best six batters, rather than his involvement in the ball-tampering scandal in South Africa in 2018.
"Great Test match, good to have it over in three days," Cummins said. "It was a wicket where you felt like you were a ball away from nicking it."
"Bowlers did well to bowl out Australia inside 300, but our batters did not get going," added West Indies skipper Kraigg Brathwaite.
"As batsmen, it is good for guys to get a feel of playing [Test] cricket and what it is like to play the number one team. It is about learning how to score and how to put away the bad ball."