Playing in Wednesday's Sheffield Shield match against Victoria seemed an impossibility for Trent Copeland eight weeks ago when he looked down and saw the bone of his right index finger poking out of the skin.
The ex-Test paceman immediately thought his career was over after misjudging a catch at first slip off the bowling of Doug Bollinger, resulting in a compound dislocation, smashed volar plate, ruptured ligaments and a bit of blood seeping through the punctured skin.
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The doctor's prognosis was slightly more promising than Copeland's initial fears, although came with a warning that it could take 12 months for a cricketing return.
"I was worried whether I was even going to be able to play cricket again," Copeland said. "I looked straight down and I could see my bone coming through the skin pointing at me.
"The worry initially was whether I'd still have the feeling in that finger to be able to feel how to let the ball go, and bowl an inswinger and outswinger. When it's your right index finger, as a bowler that's really your livelihood.
"I had to get morphine in an ambo to the hospital. I experienced the green whistle – if you talk about the green whistle, half the population know exactly what you're talking about, half have never been in enough pain to know which is probably a good thing.
"It just dulls the pain, sends you off with the fairies just for a little bit."
Were it not for the "green whistle", Copeland may not have been so forgiving to the emergency doctor that saw to him before his surgery.
![Painful: Trent Copeland is focused on playing well against Victoria.](/web/20170201103346im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/2/g/m/8/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gu2d4y.png/1485867885136.jpg)
"I was sitting in the ER, they put a ring block in my finger, I still couldn't feel the pain as much but the bone was still out of the skin with a bit of blood on it," Copeland said.
"The surgeon came into the ER and was pushing and prodding around.
![Bad break: X-rays show the fracture in Copeland's finger.](/web/20170201103346im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/2/i/k/g/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gu2d4y.png/1485867885136.jpg)
"Without giving me any warning he just grabbed my finger and yanked it and pulled the bone back in and he looked straight at me and he said, 'well that was easy, it went straight back in'.
"It was one of the more disgusting things I've ever felt, or seen. He obviously did it day in, day out and didn't have an issue with it."
Copeland was conscious during surgery, which sewed up the finger and revealed there was no break in the bone thus significantly reducing his recovery time.
He had to carry a special putty around with him after the surgery to strengthen the finger before making his return to second XI cricket last week.
Copeland played grade cricket at the weekend and is desperate to return on Wednesday with the Blues precariously placed in fourth spot on the shield ladder, two wins behind table toppers Victoria.
"If there were pins and stuff it could have been a seriously long time, potentially even [my] career so I got lucky in terms of what eventuated," Copeland said.
"The surgeon did say 'you're going to be in pain doing things for the next 12 months no matter how well you recover it'. There was a little bit of acceptance there that day-to-day life is going to be fine but if I get hit with a cricket ball it's going to be bloody sore.
"It hasn't changed my bowling one bit which has been an amazing outcome really."
The quick bowler joins Sean Abbott (ankle) and Moises Henriques (side strain) in returning to the side from injuries that kept them out of the last shield game in December, while Nick Larkin has been drafted into the squad after blasting back-to-back double centuries in the Futures League.
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