Wade replaces injured Khawaja ahead of Thursday’s semi-final

MANCHESTER: Defending champions Australia suffered a setback ahead of their mouth-watering World Cup semifinal against hosts England when prolific opener Usman Khawaja was ruled out of the remainder of the tournament.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) announced on Wednesday that it has approved the inclusion of Matthew Wade in place of the injured Khawaja.

“The ICC has confirmed that the Event Technical Committee of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2019 has approved Matthew Wade as a replacement player for Usman Khawaja in the Australia squad for the remainder of the tournament,” it said in a statement.

The ICC received the relevant paperwork at 10h41am local time on Wednesday from Cricket Australia to apply to replace Khawaja who has sustained a hamstring injury which has ruled him out of further participation in the event.

The replacement of a player requires the approval of the Event Technical Committee before the replacement player can be officially added to the squad.

The Event Technical Committee of World Cup 2019 consists of Geoff Allardice (ICC, ETC chairman), Campbell Jamieson (ICC representative), Steve Elworthy (CWC representative), Alan Fordham (host representative), Harsha Bhogle and Kumar Sangakkara (both independent representatives).