Wood out of India tour after new ankle blow

Mark Wood has been ruled out of England's tour to India after the discovery that he bowled at the tail end of the English domestic season with a broken ankle.

It all means that Wood faces a third ankle operation within a year and, however optimistic the prognosis, it is bound to cast doubts on the resilience of England's fastest bowler and invite concerns about his career both at county and England level.

Wood had already been ruled out of the one-day and Test series in Bangladesh and his hopes of recovering in time for the India tour were banished when it was discovered that he fractured a bone in his left ankle when bowling in a Specsavers County Championship match against Surrey in September.

With Durham under threat of relegation, he chose to ignore warning signs that something was wrong and battled on gamely. Durham stayed up, but it all came to naught when the ECB relegated them anyway after reluctantly intervening to prevent their bankruptcy.

England's national physiotherapy lead Ben Langley put an optimistic slant on Wood's recovery, taking comfort from the fact that the injury is different to the one that required two earlier operations.

"Woody showed his commitment to Durham with the way he bowled 35 overs in that Surrey game, and we know now that he also showed a hell of a lot of courage and resilience," Langley said.

"His foot and ankle swelled up hugely during the game, which was obviously worrying, and then we were perplexed when nothing significant showed up on the first scan.

"It was only when we got him in for a second scan that we discovered he'd been playing on despite having fractured a bone.

"So it's a different injury to what he's had the previous surgery for, and there's no reason to think that when he's had this bone fragment removed, he won't be able to get back to bowling as well he has for Durham, England Lions and England in the second half of the 2016 summer."

Wood has been awarded a central Test contract by England for 2016-17 - without such an award it would have been questionable about whether Durham could have afforded his salary so soon after requiring a financial bailout from the ECB - but his ability to fulfil a full international summer remains unproven.

He made a blistering comeback in the second half of the summer, delivering some of the most potent fast-bowling spells of the season as he helped Durham's to the final of the NatWest T20 Blast and also featured in England's 4-1 victory over Pakistan in their one-day international series.

He bowled more than 200 overs in all competitions, purportedly without ill effects, but when he pulled out of the Bangladesh tour the problems became evident. Concerns can only have deepened with the latest news.