Tag Archives: Lehmann

Got That Right

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In the eyes of cricket fans, the selectors can doing very little right. The howling noise over the selection of Tim Paine and Shaun Marsh for the Ashes was deafening.

Now, with Australia 2-0 up in the series, it seems fitting to give the selectors a pat on the back not only for the selection of Paine and Marsh, who have played well, but for the contenders they did not pick.

Many felt Matthew Renshaw was hard done by when discarded in favour of Cameron Bancroft, but the truth is it was an excellent call by the selectors. In the first five games of the Sheffield Shield this season, Renshaw has scored 111 runs in 10 innings at an average of 12.33 and with a top score of 19. At 21, he is young enough to work on his game and regain his Test spot at some point, but he has a lot of work to do.

None of the prospective wicketkeeper candidates have shown they should have been picked over Paine. Peter Nevill has scored 221 runs at 31.57 in 8 innings, with a single half-century. Matthew Wade’s form with the bat has not improved appreciably; he has 154 runs at 22.00 in this year’s Shield, with only one half-century (72 not out in Round Five). Excluding that innings, he has not passed 30.  Alex Carey scored his maiden first-class ton (139) in Round Five, and has 301 runs at 43.00 so far for the season. Promising, but more evidence is required. Jimmy Pierson scored an 82 not out in Round Five but has scored only 156 runs at 22.29 in 8 innings.

First, top order contenders: Hilton Cartwright was considered for the Ashes but has done poorly in the Shield; he has scored 216 runs at 21.60 this Shield season, suggesting the decision to omit him from the Test squad was the correct one. Nic Maddinson was not seriously in contention for the Ashes, and a good thing, too, with only 177 runs at 17.70 so far this season. Why his name gets mentioned for a Test recall is a mystery to me.

Middle order contenders Kurtis Patterson (260 runs at 28.89) and Jake Lehmann (336 runs at 37.33) have not demonstrated that they should have been selected over Shaun Marsh. Lehmann in particular has seen his scores fall away after his scores of 103 and 93 in Round Two nearly got him a Baggy Green. Since then, his scores have been 13, 24, 1, 17, 43 and 26. Good call, selectors.  Marcus Stoinis has only batted five times this season and has only 103 runs at 20.60. Again, well done, selectors.

Travis Head is not far away, with Shield scores of 67, 80, 132 and 65 so far this season. He has scored 421 runs at 42.10 and must remain in contention but is probably slightly behind Glenn Maxwell in the race for a Test spot in the middle order (see ‘Zombies Live!’).

All in all, the selectors deserve some credit as much for the players they didn’t pick as for those they did. But they probably won’t get it.

 

 

 

Some Spine in the Middle Order

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Mitchell Marsh has gone home injured from India, hounded by cruel but accurate headlines labelling him Australia’s worst ever No. 6. It’s not his fault – it’s the selectors who persist in filling the No. 6 slot with a so-called ‘all-rounder’ who bats a bit and bowls a bit but does neither well enough to help win a Test match for his team.

And now they’ve done it again.

Marcus Stoinis?

Really?

Why would you pick this guy for the Test team on the back of one (admittedly phenomenal) ODI innings against New Zealand? Like Hilton Cartwright and Moises Henriques before him, Stoinis bowls lollipop medium-pacers which India’s batsmen will chew up and spit out on their low, slow wickets. And he’s not a good enough batsman to play at No. 6 in the Test team. He simply isn’t (and neither was Mitchell Marsh). So why fly him to India? It makes no sense.

And if they don’t play Stoinis in the 3rd Test, will they play Usman Khawaja? A sensible short-term solution, perhaps, but Uzzy is not a No. 6 batsman. He’s an opener.

Oh, and by the way, Glenn Maxwell certainly isn’t the answer, either.  Substitute ‘off-spinners that don’t spin’ for ‘lollipop medium pacers’ in the paragraph above, and all the same arguments apply. Maxwell should not even be in the Test squad. He hasn’t earned it. He’s not good enough.

The Australian selectors seem to have forgotten how much better the team fared when it had a proper batsman at No. 6. Come back, Mike Hussey, we miss you. The obvious solution is to find a proper middle-order batsman.  Australia has done well in India with two decent seamers and two decent spinners. It doesn’t need a third seamer, or a third spinner. Even with Starc flying home, you could play Jackson Bird or if you must have more pace, fly Pat Cummins out to India. I don’t think it makes any difference.  Honestly, I think Bird will do fine. He lacks Starc’s threatening pace but he’s a lot more accurate.

When desperate after the series loss to South Africa, the selectors resorted to picking a couple of young batsmen who had (shock, horror,gasp) a good if somewhat short track record in the Sheffield Shield. Remember the Sheffield Shield? So far, Matt Renshaw and Peter Handscomb have done pretty well.  Both look likely to improve.

Why not stick with that approach? Australia needs a decent No. 6 batsman. There are two obvious candidates.

One is Kurtis Patterson, who bats at No. 4 for NSW. He will be 24 in May. He has played 39 first-class matches and has an average of 42.83 with 5 centuries. So far this season, he’s scored 621 runs at 47.77, with one ton and six half-centuries.

The other is Jake Lehmann, who bats at No. 5 for South Australia. The 24-year old Lehmann has played 25 first-class matches and has an average of 46.41 with 5 centuries.  So far this season, he’s made 646 runs at 49.69.

I reckon either Patterson or Jake Lehmann would be worthwhile selections. They both resemble Renshaw and Handscomb: young, and with a decent track record. The selectors are on to a good strategy. They should stick with it and abandon this catastrophic policy of picking a mediocre player to bat at No. 6.

Looking for Rock Bottom

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Most professional sporting teams experience fluctuations in form. A team doing badly will more often than not improve at some point. A strong team will eventually do less well. Rankings go up and rankings go down. After Australia was bowled out for 85 on the first day of the Second Test against South Africa in Hobart (after losing 10-86 in the first innings of the First Test in Perth), one might legitimately ask if the team is nearing rock bottom; i.e. approaching a nadir after which positive change might occur, even if it is by accident.

Not likely. I suspect rock bottom will not be found until after the tour of India next February. Until then, it’s going to be very ugly.

One of the worst Australian Test teams of recent memory has managed to lose the series against South Africa within the first hour in Hobart, losing 5-17.

Next, the world’s No. 1 Test team – Pakistan – will visit Australia for three Tests. Pakistan has good pace bowlers, good spinners and good batsmen (which, er, is why they are No. 1). It seems unlikely an Australian team this lacking in heart and skill will be any match for them. Then, unfortunately, India in February 2017 is simply a bridge too far. Beating India in India is like climbing Everest in a bikini and even a strong Australian team – which we do not have – would struggle. A result other than 4-0 to India seems inconceivable.

So there is a real chance that Australia’s string of consecutive Test losses – which will reach 5 when it loses the Second Test  against the Proteas in Hobart – could extend to as many as 13 (!) if Australia also loses the Third Test against South Africa (which seems likely) and plays a similar quality of cricket against Pakistan.

Only then can we start to talk about the team hitting rock bottom.

Only three players really can justify their positions in the team at present: Warner, Smith and Starc (four if you want to add Hazlewood). As for the rest, if you replaced any or all of them with peers currently playing Shield cricket (Kurtis Patterson or Peter Handscomb  are candidates for the middle order, but there are others), you could not do any worse. Trouble is, the selectors could not replace so many players in one go as if would be a sign of panic. As it is, only the fans are panicking.

Joe Burns and Usman Khawaja, for example, are both out of their depth. When they have made runs in the past, it has usually been against average (NZ) or weak (West Indies) teams or on flat pitches where the ball comes straight on to the bat. Neither has displayed any competence against the swinging or spinning ball. Same goes for Adam Voges, whose first-ball duck in Hobart helps to confirm suspicions that age is catching up with him. The selectors have (correctly) dumped Mitchell Marsh and might be persuaded to get rid of Voges, but having only just reinstated Burns and Khawaja, are unlikely to axe them again so soon. We are, therefore, probably stuck with both of them even if Voges is dropped.

As we and others have said, the Aussies can hit but they can’t bat (see Hitting vs Batting, and the Invisible Man). The Australians’ complete and utter absence of skill against the swinging, seaming or spinning ball over the past five years or so suggests there is no quick fix. The coaching must be called into question. The turnaround will take a long time.

Darren Lehmann’s blokey she’ll-be-right attitude is wearing thin, and his insistence on ‘playing our natural game’ betrays an alarming lack of awareness of the problem. The Australians’ ‘natural game’ does not work in the Test arena and unless Lehmann acknowledges this, nothing will change. It is only five years since Australia was all out for 47 against South Africa in Cape Town, just over a year since it was dismissed for 60 by England in Nottingham, only three months since it folded for 106 against Sri Lanka in Galle, and only a week or so since it lost 10-86 against South Africa in Perth. Now today it has been bowled out for 85. Lessons are not being learned. Basic Test batting skills are not being acquired. Lehmann’s honeymoon has been over for a while and he desperately needs to turn things around. However, the more time goes on, the worse the batting seems to get. Will he be sacked after the series loss to Pakistan or will Cricket Australia wait until the India series is lost?

It is ironic that Lehmann’s team may well face Pakistan after six successive Test losses (assuming they lose the Third Test to South Africa). Lehmann’s predecessor, Mickey Arthur, was sacked by Cricket Australia in 2013 after four consecutive Test losses, and guess who Arthur coaches now? Yup, Pakistan.