Posted by Probably Shaun Tait, Brett Lee and Stuart Clark – but being as they’re all out of the reckoning one way or another, which bowlers will Australia pick for Perth?
Having made a point of undermining Ben Hilfenhaus, Mitchell Johnson and Nathan Hauritz by dropping them, these players are sure to return. That seems to be the way the Aussie selectors are working at the minute.
Would that be harsh on Dough Bollinger who’s only been back for one Test?
(Thanks to Curt in Houston, Texas for spotting the above on Willow Cricket.)
It would certainly be harsh on Xavier Doherty as he’s Australia’s second-highest wicket-taker in this series. He has three wickets.
Averaging a wicket an innings, Australia would only need 10 bowlers if they could find a few more as effective as Doherty.
Aussie team for the 3rd Test:
Hughes
Cowan
Khawaja
D. Hussey
Ferguson
Smith
Paine
Hauritz
Copeland
Cameron
George
Realistically I would play 10 batsmen and a wicket keeper. Make it difficult for England to take 20 wickets.
And honestly prove it to me that full time batsmen will do any worse than 1000+ runs for a half dozen English wickets. In fact there is more chance of getting wickets for mediocre bowlers….Any self respecting team would want to score runs against genuine bowlers. England might give wickets aways out of sheer boredom
Forgot to mention…Australia won’t even need a captain and hence can eliminate another out of form slot
Bring back Warnie!!!!
Even if he doesn’t take any wickets, it will be more entertaining than watching Doherty or Hauritz bowl..
even if australia put up 10 batsmen, i doubt they will survive this english attack…
I’d like to know if Ian Gregg of the Badgers CC has an Australian passport.
Celebratory Venn:
http://v4admin.sportnetwork.net/upload/66/66_0_1291707366.jpg
With recipe:
http://www.abreadaday.com/?p=1138
Actually the above is the wrong Venn – that’s the commemorative one.
The following Venn is the celebratory one:
http://v4admin.sportnetwork.net/upload/66/66_0_1291797225.jpg
The above recipe is correct, though.
Ah, that makes more sense.
It’s a good point you make about their best potential bowlers. Everyone seems to imply that Australia’s descent began just after the last ashes series with the retirements of Warne, McGrath etc.
Actually they were still pretty dominant for a fair bit after that (in tests at any rate). They couldn’t fill the rather spacious hole left by Warne but were good in most other areas. Take the last tour to West Indies, about a year and a half after the ashes – they had Lee and Clark (at the time the best opening bowling partnership in the world, Lee had matured into the leading bowler and was better than ever, Clark was doing a passable McGrath impression). they also had Symonds, who was, briefly, the best non-Kallis allrounder going around; capable of turning matches in Australia’s favour.
I think it’s the loss of them to injury, loss of form and complete personal breakdown respectively that really started them on the downward path.