Josh Hazlewood speaks on Test future after being ruled out of Ashes series due to injury

Josh Hazlewood says he has no plans to retire from Test cricket despite the shattering setback which has cost him the chance to take on England in this summer’s Ashes series.

Fast bowling champion Josh Hazlewood has declared that his Ashes heartbreak will not prompt him to quit the five-day game.

Hazlewood, 34, is determined to forge on as an all-format player for Australia despite the shattering hamstring and achilles setbacks which cruelly ruled him out of this Ashes summer.

From the 25 Test matches Australia has contested over the past five home summers, Hazlewood has played just 10 of them due to a run of untimely injuries.

But Hazlewood remains adamant his body is still robust enough for the rigours of Test cricket, pointing to the fact he was fit and firing for the majority of 2025, only for a hamstring strain to strike him at the worst possible time on the eve of the Ashes.

Australia has a mammoth 12 months of Test cricket on the horizon starting next August and spanning through to the 2027 Ashes tour of the UK, and in a huge boost for the national cause, Hazlewood – one of the best quicks of his generation – is going nowhere and believes he has plenty left in the tank.

Josh Hazlewood has been ruled out of the rest of the Ashes due to injury.

“Yeah absolutely. My body still feels as strong as ever. It’s just little things here and there that creep in. I’m still determined to play three formats as best I can,” Hazlewood told this masthead.

“You’re still going to miss the odd game here and there, no one can do it all, unless you’re a batter, but I still enjoy all the different demands of the three formats.

“It keeps it fresh getting ready and preparing for each different format.”

Test cricket remains Hazlewood’s No. 1 priority over the other formats.

Australian coaches and medical staff, along with Hazlewood, will review his preparation for the Ashes and try and identify improvements to prevent him breaking down at the onset of future Test campaigns, which has now happened in four of the past five summers.

But ultimately, Hazlewood feels this summer could have been very different for him if not for poor timings and unlucky circumstances.

Josh Hazlewood has no plans to quit Test cricket after his latest injury setback.

Hazlewood was forced to bowl 27 overs for NSW against Victoria over three consecutive days in the match where his hamstring pinged, after the Blues batsmen fell over on day two to put pressure on the studs of the Test bowling attack, which Australia could have done without on the eve of the Ashes.

“We’ll have another look at some of the stuff we’ve done during the year to get ready for a Test series but if you pull it all back, I was probably half an over away from finishing that game in Sydney injury free and then you’re away and you’re off and racing,” Hazlewood said.

“Things are pretty close.

“ … I probably say this most years but I just played for pretty much 12 months straight not really missing many games of cricket at all, then you get a four-or-five-week injury at exactly the wrong time.

“If you are only missing six weeks of the year and you’re playing the other 10 or 11 months, then it’s probably a successful season, but it’s just about the timing of the games you’re missing I guess.”

Hazlewood admits his soft spot is building up his loads to start a Test series — but once he gets over that hurdle, his record shows the big right-armer has been as durable as any fast bowler.

“For the World Test Championship Final and the West Indies series (earlier this year), I felt in a good position and got through it all. That’s four Test matches in a row,” he said.

“You’ve still got that confidence in your body that you can do it, it’s just been a little bit unlucky these few times. There was more workload in that Shield game than in a couple of these Ashes Test matches so sometimes you need a bit of luck on your side as well.”

Hazlewood said if it wasn’t for the achilles setback which struck him while bowling in the nets during the Brisbane Test, he may have been able to return for the Boxing Day or Sydney Tests.

Hazlewood’s next task will be spearheading Australia’s T20 World Cup attack in February.

Now his attention turns to spearheading the Australian attack for the Twenty20 World Cup in India and Sri Lanka in February.

“The initial (hamstring injury) is the one that sets your emotions off,” He said.

“Once you’re injured mid-series or just before a series starts, you’re chasing your tail a lot of the time anyway. I probably could have got back for one or two Tests with the hamstring but then you leave yourself quite vulnerable going into a Test match on the back of not much. Every day you’re not bowling is another day you’ve got to bowl to get back to where you were.

“Obviously things are easier when you’re up and going and you’ve got some good work under you.”

Originally published as Josh Hazlewood speaks on Test future after being ruled out of Ashes series due to injury