Marnus Labuschagne is, quite literally, gripping the bat with one good hand at the moment. A fractured bone, torn ligaments and a tendon that has pulled a sliver of bone away from his right thumb should have ruled him out for eight weeks. Instead, the Australia No. 3 has played every match since the final Ashes Test and insists he will keep going while Queensland remain in the hunt for both the One-Day Cup and Sheffield Shield.
The damage occurred at Sydney when England seamer Matthew Potts thudded one into Labuschagne’s bottom hand. An initial X-ray looked innocuous enough; a follow-up MRI told a different story. Even so, he turned out for three Brisbane Heat games in the BBL, Tuesday’s one-dayer against Victoria and is now two innings into the Shield fixture at the MCG.
“There’s a few ruptured ligaments, a high-grade tear of the tendon, and then a little bit of bone came off with the tendon,” Labuschagne said after scoring 41 on day two. His thumb is braced, the bat handle padded, and every defensive shot sends a tell-tale jar up the forearm.
Why risk further damage? “I love playing for Queensland. Love playing the game. We’re in a position where we can potentially win both competitions. So felt like it was an opportunity to just see if we can manage it, see if we manage the pain, see if we can manage a few different things and keep playing.”
Cricket Australia’s medical staff would have preferred a rest cure. Labuschagne listened, then negotiated conditions of engagement. “They gave their opinion,” he said. “The boundaries of me playing is I have to bat with a guard on, and we have to strap it and stuff like that. So there’s some give and take there, and just obviously to make sure that we don’t do any more damage to it. Hopefully over time, being in this brace for eight weeks allows it to sort of heal and re-attach the ligaments and the tendons.”
Technically, the thumb is most stressed when defending or driving; cross-bat strokes hurt less. On Thursday he looked in decent rhythm before gloving a pull to deep backward square. He did not point to the injury: poor execution, he felt, rather than physical limitation. That honesty echoed his Ashes de-brief, where he made two fifties yet never took command in the manner we have come to expect.
“There’s a few things I want to address,” he said. “Some game plan [stuff], a few different changes in technique stuff, just to get things right. I was very disappointed in that first innings. That was just a little bit of a technique thing that I just sorted out during the lunch break, just after I got out.”
Queensland’s coaching group sympathise but are hardly discouraging him. A victory over Victoria this week would move them within touching distance of a Shield final; the one-day side sits in the top two with a match in hand. Losing their linchpin now would hurt both campaigns. The counter-argument, voiced quietly around the domestic scene, is whether a short-term gain is worth the long-term risk to Australia’s most prolific batter of the past five years.
Labuschagne accepts the gamble, though the brace must stay on until early April. He will rest between games, avoiding slip catching drills and anything else that bends the thumb back. Net sessions are trimmed: five-minute bursts, bat swapped for ice as soon as the tendons complain.
So far, the compromise is holding. He admits to occasional numbness, especially after a mis-timed block, but the grip remains firm enough for his trademark Marnus shuffle and diligent leave outside off stump. If Queensland do pull off the double, the sight of their Test star waving a trophy with a splinted thumb may become one of this domestic season’s enduring images—half celebration, half cautionary tale.
