Harmison rips 'complete mismanagement' of Wood

Former England quick Steve Harmison has slammed the handling of Mark Wood's fitness as "complete mismanagement" and accused the upper hierarchy of treating the County Championship "like it's something on the bottom of their shoe".

Already reeling at 0-2 down ahead of the Adelaide Test, beginning on Wednesday, England copped another blow when the injury-plagued Wood was ruled out of the remainder of the Ashes series.

The fast bowler, who turns 36 in January, re-aggravated his chronic knee injury during the first Test in Perth and then sat out the second Test in Brisbane.

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Heading into the series opener, he had not played a competitive game since February and hadn't featured in a Test match since August 2024.

Harmison is furious that Wood did not play any games for his County Championship team, Durham, in the English summer prior to jetting off to Australia.

"They don't want their players to play County cricket. They've looked down on County cricket like it's something on the bottom of their shoe," Harmison told the talkSPORT Cricket podcast.

"They're not looking to pick from County cricket; they're looking to pick from the pathway. That's all I hear — pathway, pathway, pathway.

"But because they've got such disregard of County cricket, that's why I don't think Mark Wood went back to play for Durham.

"I was saying to Mark during the summer, if you're that close to playing in July [in the fifth Test against India], you need to play a couple of games for Durham in September.

"You play two out of the five four-day games, you find out that your hamstring is not strong enough so it needs working on, you find out that your knee will swell up so you can manage it, [and] you get these little niggles out of the way in September.

"Then you go to Loughborough in October to do all the pre-camp, then you go to New Zealand [for white-ball cricket] and you're in a better position for having confidence that your body's in a position to bowl in games."https://omny.fm/shows/wide-world-of-sports/its-the-right-call-why-mark-taylor-is-backing-australias-khawaja-call-for-third-ashes-test/embed?size=Square

Wood was hopeful of taking on India at The Oval at the end of July but a cautious England decided against playing him.

In a game between England and the England Lions at Lilac Hill Park in Perth ahead of the first Test, Wood got through eight overs before being put on ice due to hamstring tightness.

He bowled 11 overs across two innings in the Perth Test, in which he regularly hit 150 kilometres per hour but went wicketless.

"What happens?" Harmison added.

"[England says], 'Nah, we don't like County cricket, County cricket's a waste of time, County cricket is useless, County cricket is not fit for purpose'.

"[England says], 'What we'll do is we'll take him from February, we'll get him close to being fit for the last Test match in July [against India], we won't bowl him again in a match situation until November [at Lilac Hill Park], we'll send him for a scan straight after that game after eight overs, and we'll pick him in a Test match'.

"Like I said before, complete mismanagement of a bowler who is 36 years old and probably will not play Test match cricket ever again."

England dropped Gus Atkinson for the Adelaide Test and brought in fellow right-arm paceman Josh Tongue, who's taken 31 wickets at an average of 30, including best figures of 5-66, from six Tests.

Tongue will form a bowling unit with Jofra Archer, Brydon Carse, Ben Stokes and Will Jacks.

In a 63-Test career spanning 2002-2009, Harmison took 226 wickets at 31.82, including best figures of 7-12.

He was a member of the England side that defeated Australia 2-1 in the 2005 Ashes series in the UK. 

England's XI for third Test

1. Zak Crawley 2. Ben Duckett 3. Ollie Pope 4. Joe Root 5. Harry Brook 6. Ben Stokes (c) 7. Jamie Smith (wk) 8. Will Jacks 9. Brydon Carse 10. Jofra Archer 11. Josh Tongue