Cricket 2023: Australia’s World Cup XI taking shape

Australian selectors are considering a radical shift from the team that won the Twenty20 World Cup, with Mitchell Marsh set to play a key new role.

Australia is set to stack its World Cup team with all-rounders as selectors lean towards giving Mitchell Marsh the most privileged place in the batting order.

Marsh, Marcus Stoinis, Glenn Maxwell and Cameron Green could all feature in Australia’s first-choice World Cup XI, depending on fitness, form and conditions – in a formation that makes it likely one of Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc or Pat Cummins would be squeezed out of the best attack for any given game, with two specialist quicks sufficient for most Indian wickets.

It’s an ultra-flexible line-up that gives Australia specialist batting down to at least No.8, and the firming presence of Marsh batting at first drop is arguably key to the game-plan’s success.

Steve Smith’s preferred spot is at No.3, and it would say plenty about Marsh’s potential to be a World Cup man of the series if selectors were to move the master Smith down one place to accommodate the interim captain’s powers in pole position.

When Australia won three consecutive one-day international World Cups in 1999, 2003 and 2007, Ricky Ponting was anchoring the innings at No.3.

In the 2015 World Cup, which Australia claimed on home soil, selectors reacted to an early loss to New Zealand and promoted Smith to be their batting order quarterback and he smashed consecutive scores of 95, 72, 65, 105 and 56 not out in the final, including hitting the winning runs.

Smith is easy going about whether he bats at No.3 or No.4 but his preference would still be to bat at No.3 when he returns from a wrist injury, leaving selectors with a big decision to make.

“I think my record at three is where it’s best,” Smith told this masthead before the ODI team flew to South Africa for these one-day matches.

“I like to bat three. Obviously, I’ll do whatever the team needs, but I feel like three is my best spot.

“When I’ve got in early in particular, that’s when I’ve played my best innings.”

Mitchell Marsh could take Steve Smith’s spot at No.3 in the batting order. Picture: Phill Magakoe / AFP

But Smith acknowledges that in white ball cricket, any batter would want to bat as high as possible, because it’s the best time to make runs.

Australia may feel they can really take matches away from opposition teams if they have Marsh’s bulldozing stroke play following on from left-hand dashers Travis Head and David Warner opening the batting.

If early wickets fall, though, then Smith is there to steady the ship at No.4 with plenty of batsmen still to go with him if Australia has Cameron Green or Alex Carey batting as deep as No.8.

It will be hard for Australia to make a final call until Smith is back playing, hopefully in the warm-up ODIs against India on the eve of the World Cup, but in the two ODIs in South Africa so far it’s been Marsh at No.3 even with Smith like-for-like Marnus Labuschagne making his presence felt.

Now that Australia has already picked its preliminary 15-man World Cup squad, Australia’s selection panel is too loyal to tap a selected player on the shoulder to shoehorn in Labuschagne (unless there’s a fitness issue).

Labuschagne should, however, stay with the squad through to the end of the warm-up matches in India to shadow Smith and Maxwell, and replace them should either man fail to recover from injury.

It’s a great sign for Australia that its next man up, Labuschagne, has a point to prove and has two matchwinning scores under his belt should any member of the 15 need to be replaced between now and the end of the tournament.

Marnus Labuschagne is a handy back-up batter. Picture: Phill Magakoe / AFP

Smith, for one, believes Labuschagne’s batsmanship could be crucial in a World Cup situation, where wickets are slowing and wearing the longer the tournament goes on.

The other emerging pattern from Australia’s warm-up matches is the all-rounder heavy mentality.

In Australia’s historic first-ever Twenty20 World Cup triumph in the UAE in 2021, selectors backed in their superstar pace trio of Starc, Hazlewood and Cummins for every match as its wicket-taking strength, even if conditions suggested fast bowling doesn’t normally win in that part of the world.

The same could happen again in India if there is something in the deck for the seamers, but it looks increasingly like selectors will be comfortable with the combined overs of Green, Stoinis and Marsh being enough to compensate for having no third specialist fast man.

That way, Australia will go into a World Cup with limitless bowling options yet almost no tail.

Originally published as Cricket 2023: Australia’s World Cup XI taking shape