ODI World Cup: Marnus Labuschagne scores century against South Africa, may cause World Cup squad rethink

Marnus Labuschagne is not in Australia’s ODI World Cup squad, but as DANIEL CHERNY writes, two player of the match performances in South Africa may cause a selection rethink.

Marnus Labuschagne’s rich form since substituting into Australia’s ODI squad has created a World Cup quandry. Picture: PHILL MAGAKOE / AFP

Two games down and two man of the match performances for Marnus Labuschagne have created one fascinating dilemma for Australia’s selectors.

Subbed into the one-day series against South Africa after Cameron Green was struck on the helmet by Kagiso Rabada, Labuschagne has made 204 runs at a strike rate over 100 and been out just once.

His two innings at Bloemfontein were in vastly different match situations. The first came needing to bat time and with the lower order to guide Australia through a difficult chase. The second was with Travis Head and David Warner having already barged through the Protea attack in the early stages batting first, Labuschagne maintaining the rage en route to his second ODI ton in tandem with Warner, who posted his 20th and in doing so surpassed Sachin Tendulkar for the most centuries as an opener in cross-format international cricket (46).

In any case Labuschagne has starred on both instances, two days apart, and it is increasingly hard to justify him not being part of Australia’s squad for next month’s World Cup.

That is not to say the selection panel erred originally in bypassing Labuschagne, because his form in ODIs had been middling and the role he plays as top order stabiliser was being done better by Steve Smith.

But the fact Australia named its provisional 15-man squad with eight ODIs and a couple of official warm-ups to come before the World Cup begins in India, combined with the fact that five members of that squad are recovering from injury, meant there was always the risk of someone doing what Labuschagne has done by running hot from outside.

If not for Smith’s niggling wrist injury picked up during the second Ashes Test, Labuschagne would not have even been in the country of his birth for this series and would instead be in Queensland with Australia A for its one-day matches against New Zealand A.

Labuschagne’s century earned him a second straight player of the match award. Picture: PHILL MAGAKOE / AFP

However Australia’s depth in one-day cricket is such that Saturday’s 123-run win at Mangaung Oval was achieved with four players in the XI (Labuschagne, Tim David, Aaron Hardie and Nathan Ellis) that aren’t in the World Cup squad, and in Labuschagne and David’s case weren’t even in the preliminary 18-man squad announced last month.

It has been a mark of the Andrew McDonald/George Bailey era to ensure players know where they sit in the pecking order, and that is perhaps why Australia jumped well ahead of the September 28 deadline in announcing its squad. It is not unusual either, England, India and the Proteas have done so too.

Still, in releasing the squad during the week, Cricket Australia noted that the group remained subject to change until that date late in month.

It is a nice bit of wiggle room coach McDonald, Bailey and fellow selector Tony Dodemaide. It is easy enough to suggest that Labuschagne could come into the 15, much harder to pinpoint an obvious candidate to come out.

CA has stressed that Pat Cummins (wrist), Mitchell Starc (groin), Glenn Maxwell (ankle) and Smith should all be back for the World Cup and could feature in the next lot of preparation matches against the hosts later in September. Yet, when combined with Green’s blow, it is an unnervingly large and important group of players to be heading into the biggest white-ball event on the calendar under injury clouds.

The players in the 15 most likely to spend the bulk of time on the bench come the tournament proper are Josh Inglis, Sean Abbott and Ashton Agar, but all three have made useful contributions too already on this tour and it would be risky to head to a World Cup without a spare wicketkeeper, paceman or spinner.

Warner, notably posting his first ton in South Africa since the ball tampering scandal, has surely also cast aside any queries about his place. As McDonald kept saying in England, a big score was just around the corner.

Perhaps attrition will do its thing. While none of the sidelined quintet shape as particularly long odds to make the World Cup, someone tends to fall over at some stage. Four years ago Australia had to call in Peter Handscomb and Matthew Wade late in the tournament after injuries to Shaun Marsh and Usman Khawaja respectively.

All Labuschagne can do is continue to nag away with runs, something he was born to do.

Originally published as ODI World Cup: Marnus Labuschagne scores century against South Africa, may cause World Cup squad rethink