Is Matthew Wade the luckiest cricketer in Australia or the beneficiary of a faulty system?

MATT Wade is not the best wicketkeeper in Australia. That has never been in dispute. He’s not even the best keeper/batsman. So why is he the proud owner of a lucrative CA contract?

Matthew Wade’s shocking numbers have been laid bare.

IS Matthew Wade the luckiest cricketer in Australia?

Or is he the beneficiary of a selection philosophy that seems to time and again defy reason and most reasonable measures.

Wade is not only the incumbent national wicketkeeper in both Tests and one-day internationals but was also given a Cricket Australia contract after the protracted pay dispute, an indication he remains the preferred gloveman.

Matthew Wade’s shocking numbers have been laid bare.

Just why that’s the case beggars significant scrutiny of the men charged with determining the direction of the Australian cricket team given that on most numbers, Wade just doesn’t stack up.

The Tasmanian yap-machine was given a virtual standing ovation for taking two catches and producing a close-as-could-be stumping in the Bangladesh first innings this week.

But when the national cheer squad has to breathe a sigh of relief when the ‘keeper does exactly what he is paid to do, albeit in tough circumstances, surely that’s a sign the wrong man is doing the job.

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Wade is not now, nor was he when picked, the best wicketkeeper in Australia. That has never been in dispute.

But he was given the nod when Peter Nevill was dropped, part of mass changes following the debacle against South Africa in Hobart last summer, because selectors felt Wade offered more with the bat.

How they came to that conclusion is baffling. Nevill was coming off two single-figure scores for Australia, but had reached 60 not out against South Africa in Perth the previous Test.

Before Wade was reinserted for the third Test he had delivered, as Victorian captain, 113 runs in three matches for the Bushrangers after, controversially as it would become, elevating himself up the batting order.

Wade keeps wicket while Peter Nevill bats for NSW. Picture: Gregg Porteous

Wade passed 50 just once in four innings for the Vics, and prior to that battled his way to 84 runs in three innings in the domestic one-day competition.

That hardly screams “get him in now”.

Since then, in 10 Tests, and 16 innings, both at home last summer and then in India and now Bangladesh, Wade has shown himself to be an abject failure in a brittle Aussie middle-order that has continually crumbled.

Wade has passed 50 just once, scored in single-figures 10 times, and averages 20, a number boosted by three not outs. Remove them, and his batting average is 16.

Sent back to the Sheffield Shield last summer, Nevill showed his batting prowess, punching out 625 runs, with three hundreds and a massive 176 not out as his highest score.

Going back through previous seasons, the numbers don’t get any better for Wade.

Even in the Sheffield Shield season of 2014-15 when the then Victorian skipper poured on 572 runs, including two big hundreds, he was bested by Nevill who piled on 764 for NSW.

The arguments against Wade have to revolve purely around his batting too as that was the reason for his selection, because as his keeping has never been regarded as completely and consistently trustworthy.

Even if Australia wins the second Test against Bangladesh and avoids the embarrassment of a third-straight series-loss on the subcontinent, the selectors just can’t persist with Wade in the Ashes.

But they probably will, because the panel, chaired by Trevor Hohns, don’t seem to believe in convention.

Handscomb has been sounded out as a replacement for Wade.

That was evident in the “captain’s pick” selection of spinner Steve O’Keefe ahead of Victorian Jon Holland following Josh Hazlewood’s departure from Bangladesh.

Only one bowler, the also overlooked Chadd Sayers, took more Sheffield Shield wickets than Holland last summer. But even better than that the Bushrangers left-arm tweaker rattled through the Aussie batting line-up in a warm-up game in Darwin just last month.

Holland took five wickets in just over a session. O’Keefe, who is still serving a Cricket NSW suspension for a drunken outburst at an official function, wasn’t even in Darwin.

But “Sokky boy” as O’Keefe is enthusiastically called, was thrust in to not just the squad but the team for the current must-win clash against the Tigers in Chittagong. He took 0-79 from 23 trouble-free overs in the first innings.

Wade has managed two sharp stumpings in the second Test.

Hilton Cartwright was called in to the team too, as a back-up bowling option for lone paceman Pat Cummins. The West Australian all-rounder bowled five of 113.2 overs. That takes his grand total to nine overs in his two Tests, having made his debut in Sydney earlier this year against Pakistan.

That’s nine of 303 overs spent in the field for Australia, as a bowling all-rounder.

Wade has made no runs but has a national contract, O’Keeffe was picked for Bangladesh despite serving a state imposed suspension and having no preparation, and the all-rounder is not getting a bowl.

It all points to a selection policy based on hope and Australian cricket supporters can only hope those who pick the team know what they are doing.

Originally published as Is Matthew Wade the luckiest cricketer in Australia or the beneficiary of a faulty system?