Cameron Bancroft puts himself at forefront of Ashes selectors’ minds

Cameron Bancroft is closer a reunion with his former top order partner David Warner.

David Warner crunches a drive for the Brad Haddin XII in Southampton on Wednesday. Picture: Getty Images

Cameron Bancroft is close to making a return to the Australian Test camp and getting closer a reunion with his former top order partner David Warner.

The opener who was caught in the middle of the sandpaper scandal with his senior partner carried his bat through the last innings and was left on 93no when his team reached the winning total on the third day of the intra squad practice game.

The match had been scheduled for four days but a difficult pitch and good bowling proved too much for all batsmen except Bancroft, Warner (58) and Marnus Labuschagne (41).

All the other batsmen failed to seize the opportunity..

Victorian veteran Peter Siddle is another who looks to have worked his way into favouritism to take up one of the bowling spots.

It was a much easier match for bowlers. Siddle took five wickets for the match. James Pattinson was frugal and fierce, taking 3-19 from 13 in the second innings and 1-16 from 10 in the first. Mitchell Marsh took 5-34 in the second and batted well in the last innings.

The opener, Bancroft, has looked better than many of the senior batsmen during the practice match at the Rose Bowl and carried his bat through a difficult last hour contest with Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood on a wicket that has brought Australia’s best batsman undone.

He went on yesterday to bring up a slow but gritty half century.

While everybody brings the weight of past achievements to the contest for Ashes selection, there is a the finest of margins separating the few places notionally vacant in the squad.

Head selectors Trevor Hohns is in England along with coach Justin Langer. The pair will hold a phone hook up with Greg Chappell on Friday night Australian time. Steve Waugh has been around the camp as a mentor/coach and is expected to have some input as will captain Tim Paine.

The group will probably pick a squad of 17 to get through he five Tests and two tour games and the moment the phone is put down the difficult task of informing eight of the players that they are going home begins. Each will be told individually.

It’s a tough scenario and property stewards already have contingency plans in place for each player should they be given their marching orders.

The team will then be officially announced as there is a peculiar paranoia about leaks. Selection is apparently a matter that ranks beside official state secrets and a secret that is jealously guarded. Ahead of the last Ashes Tim Paine’s call up was in the media before he had been informed.

Should Labuschagne, Alex Carey and Bancroft not make the squad they would not be far from it as they all have county contracts which would mean they were only a

Marcus Harris and Joe Burns were presumed to be front runners to pair with Warner, but Bancroft has done himself no harm at all with his batting at Southampton and in the lead up to the match.

Things were tense between he and Warner following the South African incident and exacerbated when Bancroft did an interview that appeared to throw his senior partner under the bus, but the players have reconciled and put the past behind them.

Warner was complimentary about his former opening partner after play on day two in the practice match.

“You know what he’s like, he scraps away, he’s very good at that,” Warner said.

“We saw the way he did play out there, he had good intent, he was moving his feet forward and committing. Standing at one (first slip) I was saying this yesterday, I could see a lot of the guys’ techniques from behind the stumps.

“Everyone is scrapping as hard but I know the bowlers were saying with him, when we put it in our areas you feel like you’re going to nick off a lot of the guys, and for the guys that actually had that attention to detail and adapt, they’ve done very well.”

*England, meanwhile, have brushed off the team’s disastrous first innings 85 at Lord’s. Having bowled Ireland out for 207, Jason Roy, in his first Test, teamed with night watchman turned opener Jack Leach contributing half centuries.

Mitchell Starc sent a scare through the camp when he didn’t bowl at the start of the second innings of that match as he was taken away for scans.

While he was cleared of any injury, it highlights a concern about the demands of five Ashes Tests in a quick succession on the back of a World Cup campaign.

They know they will need a pool of fast bowlers to get through the series. Starc, who was a stand out in the World Cup, is a critical part of the Ashes plans.

Starc bowls 92 overs in 10 matches in the World Cup and was the tournament’s leading bowler with 27 wickets.

He played all five Tests in the 2015 Ashes taking 18 wickets at 30.

Josh Hazlewood will be a lock for the squad and Peter Siddle has made a bold bid for inclusion with his performance in Southampton, taking the wicket of Steve Smith (8) late on the second day to drive home his point.

Siddle’s experience in England has had him at the forefront of Langer’s mind since he accepted the coaching job.

The pair had conversations early in Langer’s tenure. Siddle was called up for the UAE tour against Pakistan and was unlucky not to play in the summer despite being in the squad.