Jamieson looking to climb back up from injury abyss that seen him be out of the game for better part of more than a year.
Jamieson looking to climb back from the ‘bottom of the cliff’.
A year has passed since Kyle Jamieson’s last international cricket match. For the second time in his career, he missed ten months due to a stress fracture of the back. Jamieson believes he is in the best position ever “from a cricket point of view” after being selected to replace Lockie Ferguson due to injury in New Zealand’s Champions Trophy team.
Jamieson’s most recent ODI was against Bangladesh in September 2023, right before the World Cup. Jamieson remarked that his return to action went “roughly around the time-frames we looked at” while reflecting on his time off.
“I had a good crew around me, and the start of it was trying to put that all together around, what that’s going to look like, and how we’re going to get from where I was at the bottom of the cliff and how we’re going to get back up to the top of it,” he said after reaching Rawalpindi ahead of New Zealand’s match against Bangladesh.
In his brief international career, Jamieson has already sustained a number of injuries. He walked out in the middle of his 17th over in a Test match at Trent Bridge in June 2022 due to “sharp pain” in his lower back. He had surgery shortly before the home Test matches against England in early 2023 due to a suspected recurrence of the back problem. Jamieson didn’t return to action until August of that year, when he participated in three ODIs and five T20Is during the UAE and England tours. He then played in two of the three ODIs while on tour in Bangladesh.
For the 2023 World Cup, New Zealand even selected Jamieson to fill in for an injured Matt Henry before adding him to the starting lineup. Jamieson played in both Test matches on the ensuing tour to Bangladesh, despite not being able to participate in the event. He missed the T20Is on “medical advice” and the ODI series against the same opposition at home due to a stiff hamstring. After that, Jamieson was exposed once more midway through the home series against South Africa.
“It’s been a long one. Obviously, a lot of hard work [has gone into the comeback],” he said. “I had to go back to square one, and rebuild a few things. [I had to] try and solidify the foundations so I can get back to this arena and take on the different forms of cricket again. It’s certainly been a long road, but it’s quite funny once you’re back in the mix and forget about how long it’s taken.”
Jamieson made a comeback by playing for Canterbury in the Super Smash and Ford Trophy, New Zealand’s domestic T20 and 50-over competitions, respectively, in the run-up to the Champions Trophy. Playing in all 12 games, he took 14 wickets at an average of 18.71 to become the Canterbury Magicians’ leading wicket-taker in the Super Smash.
“I really enjoyed being a part of a full campaign. You don’t often get a chance to be a part of long stretches of time with your domestic team,” he said. “From the cricket point of view, it was great to be back in the park and just see where your game’s at. I was always reasonably confident that part was going to be okay, but it’s just nice to obviously put it back into that arena. I guess those are some of the pressures and challenges that come with that sort of high-pressure cricket.”