Australia Out Of WTC Finals As South Africa Test Tour Postponed, New Zealand Qualifies

The Australian cricket team is out of contention for the ICC World Test Championship(WTC) as their tour to South Africa has been postponed due to medical reasons. 

Australia was scheduled to play South Africa a three-match test series starting from 3rd March, however, with Covid cases rising, CA had no choice but to call off the series for the time being. 

“Due to the public health situation in South Africa, which includes a second wave and new variant of the virus, and following extensive due diligence with medical experts, it has become clear that traveling from Australia to South Africa at this current time poses an unacceptable level of health and safety risk to our players, support staff and the community,” said Hockley.

With the series canceled, Australia is more or less out of contention to qualify for the WTC finals. With this, New Zealand has become the first team to make the Test Championship finals and will be flying to Lord's in June. 

Australia's hopes to qualify relies on England's performance against India.

India only needs to win two Tests and draw one of the other two Tests against England to eliminate Australia. It means that Aussies need England to be competitive, without winning by more than 2-0 themselves.

Another reason for Australia not able to qualify is the deduction in points due to their slow-overrate during the Melbourne Test against India.