Andrew Gale cut a frustrated figure as he discussed the injuries suffered by new ball duo Ben Coad and Matthew Fisher following the end of a shortened day three against Glamorgan at Emerald Headingley.
Coad and Fisher reported pectoral and abdominal ailments at the end of day two of this season opening LV= Insurance County Championship fixture.
Both are not reoccurring injuries and will be further assessed after this game.
The pair will definitely miss next week’s trip to face Kent at Canterbury, opening the door for the likes of David Willey, Jordan Thompson and Mat Pillans to come.
Amidst the disappointment, Yorkshire’s coach did deliver some good news on Gary Ballance’s concussion injury. He has batted in the nets and will be fit to face Kent.
Yorkshire are 298 runs behind Glamorgan at the end of a third day which saw no play possible after lunch due to snow. The Welshmen have six second-innings wickets in hand ahead of day four.
“It’s frustrating and a massive blow,” said Gale. “We’re behind in the game anyway, but when you lose two seamers it’s always going to be tough.
“Had we had Ben Coad running down the hill early this morning, a couple of quick wickets and you never know.
“But we’re certainly up against it now.
“We’ve been pretty average in this game if we’re honest. We’ve got a lot of work to do, but we’ve been thrown a bit of a lifeline with the weather.
“We have three sessions left in the game. There’s a lot of work to do, so we have to bring our A game. When we bat, we have to do it well. If we can walk off with a draw tomorrow, we can say,
‘We’ve haven’t been at our best, but at least we’ve got something out of the game’.”
On the injuries, Gale continued: “They are not reoccurring injuries.
“Coady’s is a totally different injury – a pectoral injury. And I’ve only ever seen one of them before. Fish’s is an abdominal injury. He had an ab injury last year, but it’s in a different place.
“How long they are going to be out for, at this stage I don’t know.
“All I can say is that Fish settled down pretty quickly overnight, a lot better than we thought. But we took a stance that we weren’t going to bowl him today at the risk of making it worse.
