Melbourne, Jul 16 (IANS): Australia selector George Bailey has long-term plans for pacers Lance Morris and Jhye Richardson, after missing out on the white-ball tour of the UK. The duo were given Cricket Australia central contracts earlier this year.

Morris missed the whole winter season due to a stress fracture in his back, and he is currently undergoing further rehabilitation for the same. It is a recurrence of what transpired following his exclusion from the Ashes trip in the 2022–2023 season.

The pacer had earlier sustained a side strain in his second ODI match, which curtailed his summer. He had been due to play for Seattle Orcas in ongoing Major League Cricket before scans revealed a hot spot in his back and as a result, he was not selected for the Scotland and England trip.

"Lance is still working through his return to play and getting himself right recovering from that stress fracture of the back," ESPNcricinfo quoted national selector George Bailey as saying. "Know he's progressing well, he's feeling good, he's starting to get to that point where he wants some cricket and think he's going to get a hell of a lot of it over the summer and that will be really exciting to see him back.

"Felt a little bit like with him, that we wanted to set him up for success in the long term as opposed to pushing that too early then potentially risking what we think is something that could be really exciting across this summer and beyond," he added.

On the other hand, Richardson is "fit and firing" as per Bailey after his disrupted stints in the Indian Premier League and domestic season due to a side strain. He last played for Australia against Sri Lanka in mid-2022.

"Jhye is in a similar boat. He's fit and firing now, and again looking for match opportunities. I think he'll get opportunities again across the summer. For both [him and Morris] I think it's getting through the season fit and then hopefully maximising the amount of cricket they play. Some of that will be domestic, hopefully, there will be some international opportunities [and] Australia A opportunities, then I think we set them up for success in the long term," he said.

Australia's national selector added that the dominance of the pace trio of Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, and Josh Hazlewood with Scott Boland making inroads with some stunning performances in Test cricket.

"As far as the fast bowling group goes, think we've got a pretty exciting bunch there that we haven't had the opportunity to get a lot of games into across the formats predominantly because we've had a highly successful and robust senior group of fast bowlers," Bailey said.

"Clearly some of the decisions made around this series is around priortising and getting guys right for what will be a really big summer and for some guys this is an opportunity to get a little bit more work into what they are going to need to be ready for that," he concluded.