Where are Australia's batsmen?

[Phineas]

I don't see why George Bailey doesn't makethe squad. For me he played like a test match player in the Champions Trophy. He left well and played shots when needed. For me the balance of the squad is wrong. I'd go:

Watson
Warner
Khawaja
P.Hughes
Clarke
Bailey
Wade
Agar
Pattinson
Siddle
Harris

The batting just looks stronger.

 

[War]

Prolific Katich: I never retired


Time to send up Kat signal


If that's the case, get Katich along with Bailey in the squad for OT ASAPP!!

 

[ferg512]

The key loss is bloody Mike Hussey though. I could handle Watson, Rogers, Smith, Clarke and Hughes, but the agony finding a 6th guy with Cowan, Khawaja and Warner all doing nothing shows how much Hussey is missed. Selfish bastard, retiring 6 months before an Ashes...

I think there was far more to that than what either CA or Hussey has let on, I mean they didn't even let him have a farewell match against the West Indies.

 

[midgetwars]

The Australian batsmen have shown glimpses but are so inconsistent.

Clarke, finally scored a 50 but it's stupid to rely on him all the time. England used to rely on Cook, he has done the same as Clarke and yet, the others have stepped up.

Finally, Khawaja has done something. No stupid 20s or 30s or 40s. I guess Root is too good for Clarke and Khawaja.

If Agar is a good batsman, then he got done by Hadding and the 3rd ump.

 

[Haarithan]

As Michael Holding said at the post match analysis yesterday, get all your batsmen playing against Sussex with the focus on getting maximum exposure for all your batsmen with the bat ahead of the Old Trafford test, without worrying about the balance of the playing XI up against the Sharks..

 

[zeustrojanstark]

Simon Katich has issues with Michael Clarke.So till MJC is around,Katich cant come back though i wish he comes back.Watson should come way down the order,somewhere like where M.S.Dhoni comes.Watson and his LBWs!This is very irritating.

 

[Nikhil V]

The line up will be much stronger if they select Faulkner, S Marsh, M Johnson & David Hussey to the playing XI.Two all rounders who can bat & strike the ball pretty well & two specialist batsmen with experience.

Rogers,Pattinson is plain useless..Hughes & Haddin are not living up to expectation.

 

[midgetwars]

The line up will be much stronger if they select Faulkner, S Marsh, M Johnson & David Hussey to the playing XI.Two all rounders who can bat & strike the ball pretty well & two specialist batsmen with experience.

Rogers,Pattinson is plain useless..Hughes & Haddin are not living up to expectation.

I think you got that the wrong way around. It's more like

Rogers and Pattinson are not living up to expectations and Huges and Haddin a plain useless.

Pattinson had one bad test as a bowler not much problem with that. But Haddin, has always been a horrible wicket keeper against pace. Wade was bad against spin but way better than Haddin for pace.

 

[Owzat]

The tragic state of affairs after four Test innings is that no aussie batsman has scored more than 130 runs - and that is Agar.

People want to drop Watson but it's ironic given only he and Clarke of the top seven batsmen have scored more than 100 runs in the series.

Smith made a good 53 in the 1st Test, but that innings aside has scored just 20 runs. He poses a threat as a bowler, but his batting is as vulnerable as the rest of the top order. Rogers looks promising right up to when he gets out.

Not sure what bringing in Wade will do if he is vulnerable to Swann. Erm, hello, Swann is in the England side not to mention the Root of all evil.

You can't drop the whole top seven, Clarke at least seems to be finding something resembling form and so he and other half centurion for the aussies, Khawaja, must be shoe ins for the next Test.

You could make a case for dropping any of Watson, Rogers, Hughes and Smith, and indeed Haddin. Watson does offer a fifth bowling option so might escape on that basis, and maybe work on his batting to make LBW less of a threat to him.

Smith's average is now below 30, four fifties in 18 innings not so bad, but is it enough? His bowling surely isn't enough to earn him a reprieve, but then Agar has done so little with the ball perhaps Smith should be the spinner, Watson the extra seamer and bat the keeper, whoever he might be, at eight. I mean Agar has taken half as many wickets as Smith in four times as many overs. His ER is much better, but he needs to add wickets to decent batting and reasonable bowling.

5-0 is on the cards if the players don't buck their ideas up

 

[sifter132]

You can't drop the whole top seven, Clarke at least seems to be finding something resembling form and so he and other half centurion for the aussies, Khawaja, must be shoe ins for the next Test.

WHAT??? The BESTEZ top 6 ever would be Katich, Rogers, Hodge, Bailey, Dave Hussey and Clarke - SELECTORS AREZ NOOBZZZZ Or Dave Warner in there somewhere, apparently he 'shows fight' with the bat. When did this myth surface?

You could make a case for dropping any of Watson, Rogers, Hughes and Smith, and indeed Haddin. Watson does offer a fifth bowling option so might escape on that basis, and maybe work on his batting to make LBW less of a threat to him.

Yes it's difficult. Clarke, Khawaja, Hughes, Smith, Haddin, Rogers have all made 50s - and when you're looking for batsmen, discarding a bloke who's recently made a 50 doesn't seem the wisest idea. Watson almost made a 50 and has taken some wickets. The unit as a whole looks so much worse than the individuals. And partly the ridiculous balance is to blame eg. putting left handers who like batting up the top in the middle order. Hughes and Khawaja are just sitting ducks for Graeme Swann.

As for Watson, I don't think anyone would care if he was batting at #6. But by putting himself at #1, he's painted a target on himself.
If I were Watto, I'd: a) cut the flap of his back pad off, he has a history of getting that in the way when he tries to defend straight balls, last night being a good example and b) I'd be thinking of going over the top straight down the ground. England's trying to lure him to go through square leg. I say to back himself, play straight and hit over the top. A couple of balls into the sight screen will make Cook think, c) don't play through midwicket at all, cut it out of the repetoire a la Tendulkar's cover drive free double century in Australia. You'd think if Watson could sort out his LBW issues then he'd be halfway to success.

I think there was far more to that than what either CA or Hussey has let on, I mean they didn't even let him have a farewell match against the West Indies.

Yes that was odd, Hussey of course took it in his stride because he's a great bloke, but it would be interesting to hear what might have happened there. Every run he scored in IPL was a knife to my heart because it was clear he was still happy to travel to play cricket.

 

[Aislabie]

Well, I was struck by what Jim Maxwell said about how long Michael Clarke may or may not have left in him. Without him, the batting stocks are beyond threadbare. [LINK]

 

[aussie1st]

Just thinking of the guys in the late 20s, White now actually looks an alright pick. A good season could see him spring into contention, one of the few batsmen in domestic cricket with an average over 40. He was one we invested heavily on but just didn't kick on.

You do have to wonder what the selectors were thinking not even picking Bailey for the A squad. His form might have been iffy but like White they have invested so much in him through the shorter formats that you would think he was in their plans for the longer one.

 

[Aislabie]

Exactly. With such limited resources, it makes no sense to disregard someone like Cam White who, despite some limitations, is able to fight and make runs.

Who would your pick for the next skipper be?

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

The unit as a whole looks so much worse than the individuals.

I do tend to agree with this, but that in a way is why I point the finger at the decision to bring watson in for hughes in '09. a sure fire way to get a line up under-performing is to pick players in the wrong positions for the wrong jobs.

watsons can't occupy the crease, it's not his game, he's managed once or twice to hang around and play a long innings but even the stats you posted before show an ability to hit 50s consistently but a failure to convert. It makes no sense starting the innings with someone who really struggles to last 30 overs, you're winning the toss and sending someone in to bat who will almost certainly be out by lunch.

I'm not going to speculate who they should pick instead, they have to find that balance of experience, character and skill themselves, unfortunately this job is made all the harder because the worse the batting performs, the more people are viable replacements. However, I do have a strong feeling that it would not include watson in the top 4. Also sceptical about hughes too, he feels too symbolic of the weak new generation of australians. I'd be leaving in him domestic cricket for a long.

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

1st 40.51
2nd 22.65
3rd 31.21
4th 60.80
5th 48.75
6th 30.68

that's a list of the average partnership for each wicket for australia over the last 2 years. the opening slot looks ok, however, it's been down to Cowan and Warner that it looks ok, they've managed to cross 100 3 times and are the only pair to do so. Then the obvious problem starts, the 2nd wicket partnership has the lowest average of any top 5 wicket partnerships of any team except for New Zealand's 5th and even then by 0.3 (including bangladesh). It's a tail end batting average.

The 3rd wicket one isn't much better and there aren't too many lower than that, it basically means that bowling to australia's top order is one of the easiest jobs in cricket over the last two years. I refuse to buy that australia are that bad, so there is something definitely amiss with the order, if you could get that 4th and 5th wicket number moved up to 2 and 3 australia would certainly score more runs.