(BBC) Australia captain Ricky Ponting will undergo surgery today to repair his fractured finger.
The 36-year-old suffered the injury to the little finger of his left hand during the third Ashes Test in Perth.
He aggravated the problem during the next game in Melbourne and was ruled out of the final Test in Sydney.
Ponting is now set to miss the Twenty20 matches and one-day series with England but is expected to be fit for the World Cup, which starts on 19 February.
With the 50-over tournament taking place in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, a Cricket Australia spokesman said: “There’s no problem with the World Cup, it’s just been decided that surgery is the way to go.”
Ahead of Ponting’s operation today, Cricket Australia physiotherapist Alex Kountouris said: “Ricky had further x-rays on his fractured finger which have shown that the bone fragment has further displaced and will not heal without surgery.”
The hosts trail the Ashes series 2-1 and were forced into replacing Ponting with Michael Clarke as skipper ahead of the last Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
Ponting said he was “devastated” to miss out on the match and it completed a miserable couple of months for the batsman, who scored only 113 runs in eight innings in the series, with an average of 16.14.
After playing in 152 Tests and recording 99 wins, Ponting has revealed his determination to continue as captain and a player, despite some critics down under calling for younger blood to come into the team.
There have been suggestions that Ponting may have represented his country for the last time, but team coach Tim Nielsen has insisted the injured star would wear the baggy green cap again as soon as he was fit.
Although the Australians will not play Test cricket again until August, chairman of selectors Andrew Hilditch hopes Ponting will help the team rediscover their touch.
“We look forward to Ricky completing his recovery and leading this team to a fourth successive World Cup on the sub-continent at the completion of the Australian summer,” Hilditch said recently.
In the build-up to the World Cup, Australia and England will play two Twenty20 matches on 12 and 14 January before seven one-day internationals between 16 January and 6 February.
