In the first Test, Pat Cummins took 7-89.
Pat Cummins, Australia's captain, was ruled out of the second Test against England in Adelaide because he was close to someone who tested positive for Covid-19.
Steve Smith is leading Australia in the day-night match, which starts on Thursday, with seamer Michael Neser making his debut in place of Cummins.
Cummins was eating in a restaurant and did not violate any protocols.
Australia leads the series by one.
Cummins said he was gutted to miss the Test but excited to see Neser get his chance.
He is a very skillful player and has done the hard yards.
Covid has thrown us curve balls over the last couple of years. Will be cheering!
Australia and England are playing in the first match of the series.
As soon as he was made aware that he was a close contact of the person who tested positive, Cummins was isolated and had a negative test.
Cummins and Starc were eating at the same restaurant, but Cummins and Starc were at a different table.
They are free to play because they are deemed casual contacts by South Australia Health.
Cummins is expected to be available for the third Test at Melbourne.
Cummins was going to captain Australia for the second time.
His absence is a blow to Australia's fast bowling attack, with Josh Hazlewood already ruled out with a rib injury.
Smith will lead Australia for the first time since he was stripped of the captaincy for his part in the ball-tampering scandal and attempted cover-up in South Africa.
The batter was banned for a year by CA and barred from leadership positions for two years, before he was made vice-captain after Tim Paine stepped down.
David Warner was banned for a year, while the batter received a nine-month suspension.
Smith has captained Australia in 34 of his 78 Tests so far, scoring 15 centuries at an average of 70.36 as skipper.
Head will be Australia's vice-captain.
Neser has taken over 200 first-class matches and has an average of 24.94.
There are 92 active Covid-19 cases in South Australia and 64 of them have been acquired in the last seven days.
Smith stepped down as Australia's captain last month over a historical investigation into sexually explicit texts to a female colleague, but he was due to be replaced by Tim Paine.
The cricketer withdrew from the series to take a break.
Australia beat England by nine runs at the Gabba on Saturday to take a 1-0 lead in the five-Test series.
The analysis was done.
Australian cricket commentator and journalist.
Losing Cummins is a major blow, not because of his new captaincy, but because it makes up for the loss of Hazlewood.
Jhye Richardson will make his first match in nearly three years in Australia's first Test with Starc, Neser and Jhye.
Smith is back as Test captain even if temporarily.
When he was appointed permanent vice-captain a couple of weeks ago, people were unhappy as they anticipated that Cummins would miss a Test. Nobody thought it would happen so quickly.
Smith is back again. Nick Hockley says he has served his ban and grown as a person. A lot of Australian cricket fans don't want to see this sort of thing happening to a captain who was banned for allowing cheating.
The CA protocols try to strike a balance so that players aren't completely locked down.
He said he would ask players to eat outside from now on. Which raises the question of why that was not already the protocol in a city where the virus is getting moving after a period of inactive activity.
