Cricket news: Marcus Harris has been endorsed by George Bailey as Australia’s Ashes opener
Usman Khawaja was hot favourite to open with David Warner in the Ashes before National Selection boss George Bailey dropped a bombshell on radio.
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Marcus Harris is set to open with David Warner in the Ashes, after being endorsed by National Selection boss George Bailey.
Usman Khawaja had been mounting a strong case to partner his childhood friend Warner for the first Test at the Gabba, but the veteran will now have to focus on pushing for a re-entry to Test cricket at No.5 – the only batting position now left vacant.
Harris made a hundred in his first Sheffield Shield match this summer, but really impressed selectors in English county cricket during the winter where he smashed four centuries.
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The powerful left hander is the incumbent having played the last Test against India last summer, but averages just 23.77 from his 10 Tests for Australia – including three on the 2019 Ashes.
Bailey said he was impressed by Harris’ consistency this year and declared selectors want to give the 29-year-old an extended run at the top.
“Harry’s had limited opportunities in the past, and he’s been in and out a bit, so we’d love nothing more than for him hopefully to get an opportunity to get an extended run at it,” Bailey told radio RSN.
“What we have liked is his consistency. He’s obviously been a prolific run scorer at domestic level here, but we also love the fact he went overseas and had a great year for Leicester as well.”
ASHES FORM TRACKER: MONITOR EVERY SELECTION HOPEFUL HERE
Bailey said the No.5 spot for the Ashes was still open but indicated the panel was “getting close.”
Khawaja, Travis Head and white ball star Mitchell Marsh could be the leading contenders to take the final spot in the middle order, with Victorian Nic Maddinson also building an impressive case as well as the smokey Alex Carey.
“That No.5 spot is open, but we’re starting to get fairly close there,” Bailey said.
Cummins’ captaincy credentials given huge tick
- Ben Horne and Johnathan Moran
The fast bowling fraternity is in awe of Pat Cummins’ decision to pursue the Australian captaincy, because they candidly admit they couldn’t have done the job themselves.
Superstars Mitchell Johnson and Brett Lee have both expressed concerns over the strain the Test captaincy might take on the man who is also looked to as the spearhead of the attack, but ultimately both support Cummins as Tim Paine’s likely successor.
All-time pace bowling great Glenn McGrath has already declared he feels the demands would be too much on Cummins and endorsed Steve Smith for a second crack at the captaincy.
Not since Ray Lindwall for a one-off Test in the 1950s, has a fast bowler captained Australia.
Cummins is keen to take on the responsibility of captaincy if it’s offered to him, and that willingness to put his hand up is enough to satisfy Johnson and Lee despite their reservations.
“What I can say is that he has the qualities of a skipper, but also too there is a lot of pressure on a fast bowler as a captain,” Fox Cricket analyst Lee told News Corp as an ambassador for Jacob’s Creek.
“It is hard enough trying to be a fast bowler and making sure that you are taking care of your own duties rather than looking after another 10 guys as well.
“It is a big job.
“Fast bowlers however have been captains … he’s got an exceptional cricket brain, Pat Cummins … I don’t want to put any pressure on him. Could he? Absolutely. But would I want him to be, well that is a question for him.”
Ashes hero Johnson knows he wouldn’t have entertained captaincy as a fast bowler, but is backing Cummins’ to give it a crack when Paine decides to retire.
“I think it’s just too hard for a bowler, but ultimately if he thinks he can do it, then why not,” said Johnson, who is an ambassador for the cricket World Cup’s accommodation partner Booking.com.
“You just don’t want it to have an impact on his performance.
“The thing for me is you need to have that bit of a break from the game when you’re a bowler. You just need to switch off.
“But maybe it might work for him. It may help him if he’s had a bad spell or a bad over, where he’ll be able to switch off and go, ‘OK I need you to bowl and Joshy (Hazlewood), I need you on now.’
“It might take his mind off it, and it might really work for him. It could go either way.
“I wouldn’t mind seeing it but I guess I’m just looking at it from my point of view and what I would have done in that situation and personally I wouldn’t do it.
“But if he’s putting his hand up and he’s keen to do it, why not have a crack.”
Cummins is considered the firm favourite to be Australia’s next captain having received the high profile backing of Greg Chappell, Steve Waugh and the man who first pushed him forward as a candidate – Michael Clarke.
But McGrath told Fox Sports last month that he feels Smith should be the next in line.
“Fast bowlers can be captain, they’re the most intelligent in the team, but the way I look at it is when a batsman is batting he can concentrate solely on his batting, whereas a bowler when he’s bowling is constantly thinking about who’s bowling at the next end, what change is coming up and where the game is heading,” said McGrath.
“I just think the workload for a fast bowler is a little bit much.”
THE ‘GUT FEEL’ CALL WHICH COULD CHANGE ASHES
George Bailey has been urged to draw on the inspiration behind his own brief but vibrant Test career and promote Mitchell Marsh for the Ashes.
Australian selectors trusted their “gut feel” to inject Bailey into the 2013-14 Ashes summer on the back of his electric form in white ball cricket, and he delivered with a series of rapid-fire cameos which compounded the misery for England in a 5-0 whitewash.
One of the heroes of that campaign Brad Haddin, believes former teammate Bailey could now apply the same logic in his role as national selector and consider T20 go-to-man Marsh as the enforcer to give the side some runaway momentum at No.6.
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Marsh’s Test record is modest and his first-class form non-existent, but his crisp ball-striking is motoring Australia towards a World Cup final and Haddin said the West Australian is “ripe for the picking”.
“It’s similar for me to George Bailey. He came off that red-hot white ball form leading into the 2013-14 Ashes where Australia won 5-0 at home and he batted at No. 6,” Haddin told Fox Cricket’s World Cup Live show.
“Mitch Marsh is that gut-feel selection. You can look at the analytics and red-ball games going on, but I just think he’s ripe for the picking at the moment.
“Come in at six, he’ll move the game forward. If the top order do their job, he could be really proactive batting with the tail. Imagine him at eight, nine and 10.”
Australia is still yet to finalise a 25-man squad to play a pre-Ashes intra-squad selection trial on December 1, but Marsh will well and truly be knocking on the door if Justin Langer’s team powers into the World Cup final.
It’s understood Marsh will complete two weeks’ quarantine with members of the Ashes squad returning from the World Cup in Queensland, so would be on hand should selectors call him up to the Australia v Australia A tour match.
Other World Cup players not in Ashes plans, may fly home separately to Sydney so they can avoid two weeks quarantine.
Marsh doesn’t believe his Test career is dead.
“I certainly have aspirations to keep playing Test match cricket for Australia,” he told World Cup Live.
“ … Anytime you play, you’re pressing for selection, so I still have high hopes to play Test match cricket again. But I’m realistic that I’m probably a couple back at this stage and I have to make a few runs.”
Since being promoted to No. 3 in the Australian T20 side, Marsh has averaged 40.36 from 11 innings.
He has two Test centuries to his name, although his effectiveness at No. 6 would rely on the Australian Test top order doing its job.
A solid foundation set by the top five would give Marsh the platform to bat his natural way and scare England bowlers with his ability to take the match away in quick time.
Fellow Fox Cricket expert Kerry O’Keeffe feels Marsh should be considered as much for what he brings as a bowler, although he faces stiff competition from in-form Sheffield Shield stars Travis Head, Usman Khawaja and Nic Maddinson.
The selection of Marsh and Cameron Green would give Australia’s bowling attack a versatility it hasn’t seen for a couple of decades.
“Last year against India, Cameron Green didn’t get a wicket, so Tim Paine kept having to bring back the specialists,” O’Keeffe told Fox cricket’s World Cup Live.
“Mitch Marsh got seven wickets in his last Test two years ago — he gets people out in Test cricket.”
Ashes fairytale: Why Paine train stops in Hobart
— Ben Horne and Brett Stubbs
Pressure is mounting on Australia to give Tim Paine a fairytale Ashes farewell in Hobart, with the MCG looming large as a major rival should the current Test schedule fall over.
Cricket Australia remains committed to delivering the fifth Test in Perth as scheduled and is not even considering a Plan B at this stage.
But broadcasters Fox Cricket and Channel 7 and the England Cricket Board are yet to be briefed on what crossing the border to play a Test in Western Australia actually means, so its status still remains far from certain.
Should the fifth Test be moved due to the limitations of Western Australia’s strict border rules, the two leading contenders to take over could be Hobart — underwritten by the Tasmanian Government and the sentimentality of Paine — and the commercial appeal of packing out the giant MCG for another Ashes Test.
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It’s understood Fox Cricket and Seven wouldn’t have a major issue whether the fifth Test was moved to Hobart or Melbourne — or Sydney or Canberra for that matter — but what they would push for would be for the finale to be another day-night Test.
Tasmanian chairman Andrew Gaggin says Hobart would be ready to turn the Bellerive lights on if that’s what was required to give the Australian captain a historic sign-off.
“I don’t know what England’s position is, but if they (CA) want to play a day-night Test here, we would play a day-night Test here,” Gaggin told News Corp.
“It doesn’t really matter to us one bit whether it is played during the day or night. We could do both.
“If they came to us and said, ‘you can have an Ashes Test but it has got to be day-night,’ well we’d switch on the lights.”
Confidence is growing within Cricket Tasmania that the state is in pole position to host its biggest ever sporting event.
But a week after Cricket Australia warned states it was cash poor following the ravages of Covid, the potential for the colossal MCG to fill the game’s coffers by hosting a second Ashes Test for the summer for the sports-starved people of Melbourne could be difficult to ignore.
There is a feeling in Tasmania that Sydney wouldn’t be able to host back-to-back Tests, but that Melbourne is a major threat, particularly if the Victorian Government wanted to throw its chequebook around.
The Perth Test is invaluable to broadcasters because it acts like a day-night Test by giving east coast viewers prime time action.
If Perth had to be eliminated from the schedule, there’s no doubt broadcasters would love to see it replaced with a day-night affair.
That would be subject to approval from the England Cricket Board, however, with swing king Jimmy Anderson in their arsenal, the thought of a second pink ball Test might not be the scary prospect it would be for other nations touring Australia.
Cricket Australia and broadcast sources are growing increasingly confident Perth might be able to hold onto its Test, despite Western Australia almost no chance of opening its borders before late January, well after the match finishes on January 18.
However, it remains to be seen whether battle weary England players will agree to the terms of entering WA, which would mean being confined to hotels outside of match play.
Particularly if part of the bargain was England and Australian players having to play under virtually quarantine-like conditions for the preceding Test in Sydney.
Broadcasters also have legitimate concerns with how to get crew and commentators into WA, with DRS technology in particular relying on specially trained technicians to operate it.
There is no doubt that the England Cricket Board have already sacrificed plenty by agreeing to quarantine in Queensland instead of landing in NSW where they could have avoided lock-up altogether and it remains to be seen what their tolerance levels will be as the tour goes on.
Coach clue reveals Khawaja’s Ashes fate
Former England coach Trevor Bayliss believes Usman Khawaja is Test match bound this summer, and a shock development could see him also fulfil his dream of playing in Pakistan.
Bayliss now coaches Sydney Thunder in the Big Bash and is expecting to lose his in-form captain to Ashes selection following his electric start to the domestic season for Queensland.
Khawaja’s versatility as a top order and middle order option has him firming for an extraordinary Test comeback, which could grow into even more of a fairytale should he make runs against England.
Born in Islamabad and proud of his Pakistani heritage, Khawaja, 34, has longed for an opportunity to play Test cricket in his former homeland – and now that prospect is as close as it’s ever been to becoming a reality.
In a development, which took the cricket world by surprise, Cricket Australia on Monday night gave a preliminary commitment to touring Pakistan for three Tests, three ODIs and one T20 in March 2022, despite the fact New Zealand and England recently pulled out of touring over security concerns.
Khawaja’s first step will be gaining an Ashes recall, and with two Sheffield Shield matches still to come to add to back-to-back hundreds to start the summer, the left-handed veteran’s case would become impossible to ignore with one more big score, if it isn’t compelling enough already.
Bayliss can’t see how Khawaja won’t feature in Justin Langer’s Ashes squad.
“Hopefully he does get picked up. That’d be a feather in his cap. Obviously there’s some positions available,” Bayliss told News Corp.
“With the bubble type scenario we’ve had the last year or two, they possibly carry an extra batter or two as well, so there’s probably a pretty good chance he will have some sort of involvement.
“With any of our (Thunder) players you hope they get recognised to play at the highest level.
“We’ve named him as captain. The experience he’s got, he’s very well spoken, obviously a good player and highly respected by all the other players in the Thunder set-up.
“Obviously we’d miss him if he doesn’t play, but on the other hand we’re hoping he does get an opportunity (for Australia).”
Australia has not toured Pakistan since 1998, and it would be a landmark moment in Test cricket for the side to return.
Khawaja – who immigrated to Australia with his family aged five – has spoken before about his desire to one day play in his country of origin.
Following the controversial decisions of New Zealand and England to withdraw, Khawaja publicly called on Test nations to not leave the cricket loving country stranded.
“I feel it’s very easy for players and organisations to say no to Pakistan because it’s Pakistan,” said Khawaja in September.
“I think the same thing would apply, too, if it were Bangladesh.
“But nobody would say no to India, if they’re in the same situation.
“Money talks, we all know that, and that’s probably a big part of it.
“They keep proving time and time again through their tournaments that they’re a safe place to play cricket. I think there’s no reason why we shouldn’t go back.”
Khawaja has said he would no hesitation in travelling to Pakistan and has faith in their security protocols.
Australia’s touring of Pakistan will still be predicated on final security checks, but chief executive Nick Hockley has given his PCB counterparts a strong show of faith that the team intends to tour.
Khawaja’s greatest innings in Test cricket came against Pakistan in the UAE in late 2018, scoring a warrior-like century to save Australia a Test match that appeared gone.
Turning 35 a week after the first Ashes Test at the Gabba, Khawaja hasn’t played a Test since he was dropped during the 2019 Ashes in England.
Originally published as Cricket news: Marcus Harris has been endorsed by George Bailey as Australia’s Ashes opener
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