"Enjoyed the green whistle for an hour yesterday" - Pat Cummins provides update on Steve Smith's finger injury after 2025 WTC final loss

Australian captain Pat Cummins provided an update on Steve Smith's injured finger ahead of the Test series against the West Indies. While the right-arm speedster said Smith remains highly positive, he hinted at the veteran batter missing the opening Test against the West Indies.

Smith, 36, seemingly dislocated his finger while fielding at slip on Day 3 of the World Test Championship (WTC) final against South Africa at the Lord's Cricket Ground. The right-handed batter walked off straight away and was taken to the hospital for X-rays. Although Smith avoided surgery, he didn't take the field on day four.

At the post-game presser, Cummins said that Smith's injured finger will roughly take between 10 days to a couple of weeks. As quoted by ICC, he said:

"It's a little bit of a wait and see., but he's good and I think he enjoyed the green whistle for an hour yesterday. But he's positive. I think it's somewhere around the 10 days to two weeks, and then maybe you try and bat with a splint and see how that looks. So I think it's a bit of a wait and see. I'd say first Test (against the West Indies) maybe unlikely, and then kind of go from there, but it's a bit early just to tell."

Smith fought well in the first innings of the WTC final at Lord's against the Proteas, scoring 66 to save Australia from disaster. However, he perished for 13 in the second. With 282 set for the Proteas to win, Aiden Markram's 136 propelled their side to a five-wicket victory.

---

"It's probably more for the selectors and me to sit down and we kind of map it ahead" - Pat Cummins

Pat Cummins. (Image Credits: Getty)

Cummins went on to claim that the new WTC cycle will be a reset and reckons he will have to sit with the selectors to map their path ahead, adding:

"I think we've got a couple of weeks before the first Test against the Windies, so I think we'll sit down and have a bit of a think after we digest this game. But for me, I think a new WTC cycle in some ways does feel like a bit of a reset. It's probably more for the selectors and me to sit down and we kind of map it ahead. I think, say, in white-ball series, a lot of the time it's kind of you build on four-year cycles around World Cups for ODIs. And I think maybe it's an opportunity in the Test match to do something similar, but it's a little bit early to tell."

Australia's tour of the West Indies begins on June 25 with the opening Test set to be hosted by Barbados.