Katherine Brunt, Nat Sciver, Lauren Winfield-Hill and Beth Langston all fly out to Australia today as part of England’s extended party to contest the re-jigged Ashes series.
The Diamonds quartet are spread across the England senior and A squads which head Down Under on a chartered flight alongside some family members.
Brunt, Sciver and Winfield-Hill are all part of the Ashes senior squad for a multi-format series which now starts on January 20, a week earlier than originally scheduled.
The series starts with a trio of T20 internationals in Adelaide between January 20 and 23 before a solitary four-day Test at Canberra, starting on January 27.
A trio of ODIs then take place between February 3 and 8.
The schedule change has come as a result of both teams having to undergo 10 days of hotel quarantine in New Zealand ahead of the one-day World Cup in March through to early April.
Seamer Langston is part of the England A squad who travel as support.
The two squads will play a pair of T20 warm-up fixtures on January 15 and 16. The Ashes will be televised by BT Sport.
Brilliant Jonny Bairstow has no intention of ending his unbeaten Ashes innings despite the potential of a broken thumb.
Bairstow’s unbeaten 103 on day three of the ongoing fourth Test at Sydney was England’s first century of the series, the seventh of his Test career and his 25th ton in first-class cricket.
In helping England recover from 36-4 to 258-7 in reply to Australia’s 416-8 declared, Bairstow suffered a nasty blow on the thumb whilst batting against home captain Pat Cummins.
But, in typical Bairstow fashion, the Yorkshire star was not to be beaten and ensured the tourists avoided the follow-on in their bid to gain a positive result.
“My thumb is sore, but you’re playing in the Ashes and you’re going to take blows,” said Bairstow. “It’s going to take a lot to remove me from things.
“I might get an X-ray on it, but I reckon I’ll still be there in the morning.”
Duanne Olivier, who remains contracted as Yorkshire’s overseas player for 2022, claimed his 50th Test Match wicket for South Africa earlier this week.
Olivier’s initial status as a Kolpak player when he joined Yorkshire ahead of 2019 means he had not played international cricket for the Proteas since the start of that year.
But, on the back of 28 wickets in four early winter first-class matches for the Lions side in his homeland, he returned to the Test Match fold against India in Johannesburg.
As South Africa levelled the three-match series at 1-1, Olivier claimed three wickets in the first innings and one in the second.
The third and deciding Test starts in Cape Town on Tuesday.
Harry Brook and Jordan Thompson have been caught up in the ongoing Coronavirus issues surrounding the Big Bash in Australia.
The Yorkshire pair are currently sidelined from Hobart Hurricanes duty having been close contacts of team-mate Josh Kann, who tested positive.
Brook and Thompson missed Wednesday’s defeat against Adelaide Strikes in Adelaide and will be unavailable again tomorrow when the Hurricanes face Brisbane Heat at the Gabba.
The Hurricanes say they have both returned negative PCR tests, but will be missing “out of an abundance of caution”.
The BBL has been beset by Covid issues over the last couple of weeks, with Melbourne Stars and Brisbane the victims of multiple cases and having to field significantly weakened teams.
Somerset batter Tom Lammonby, currently playing grade cricket in Australia, has been drafted into Hobart’s squad as overseas cover for the second time in the tournament.
Yorkshire’s squad are back in pre-season training, returning to the duty on Monday just gone.
The club confirmed former England Under 19s coach Tim Boon, also an ex-player and coach with Leicestershire, is leading a seven-man interim coaching team put in place by Darren Gough.
Boon, Doncaster-born, is being helped by former Yorkshire and England bowlers Ryan Sidebottom and Steve Harmison amongst others.
Yorkshire and Northern Diamonds duo Joe Root and Nat Sciver have both been nominated for respective Player of the Year awards from the International Cricket Council.
Root is on a four-man shortlist for the Men’s Cricketer of the Year, an award named the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy.
The Yorkshire batter and England Test captain has been nominated alongside Pakistan duo Shaheen Afridi and Mohammad Rizwan and New Zealand captain Kane Williamson.
Root’s superb 2021 was highlighted by scoring 1,708 runs in the calendar year, more than any other batter and the third most by anyone in Test history for a calendar year.
Sciver has been nominated for the Women’s T20 Cricketer of the Year for 2021, scoring 153 runs and taking 10 wickets.
She has been nominated alongside batting trio England’s Tammy Beaumont, Ireland’s Gaby Lewis and India’s Smriti Mandhana.
You can vote for Root and Sciver via www.icc-cricket.com.
