Australia squad for first Test against Sri Lanka: Tim Paine (c/wk), Josh Hazlewood (vc), Joe Burns, Pat Cummins, Marcus Harris, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Will Pucovski, Matt Renshaw, Mitchell Starc, Peter Siddle 

Sections of this squad will now form the nucleus of our Ashes squad. Marsh brothers gone. Finch gone. Paine retains the captaincy.  Brave selections with the addition of Renshaw and Pucovski. Reckon they must had one eye on Renshaw's  short England County stint last year in which he scored 3 red ball centuries.. with a view to picking him for the Ashes. It certainly is not due to his  2018/19 Shield returns. Starc and Hazlewood survive. Again without Smith we lack that solid middle order. 

deleted

I am not saying discriminate.. be wary. These mental issues stem I understand from his being hit and suffering concussion on three occasions. Not sure in what matches. But that is telling me he is uncomfortable with the fast short ball. So he will be going into his debut match with  added pressure thru his doubts over whether he will be hit again. and lose more game time. I would have eased him into international cricket via the A tour to England.

Teenage years - 4 - 3 for Victoria last season...

https://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/will-pucovski-out-of-cricket-with-mental-health-issue-20181026-p50c8u.html

It does say short ball problem a bit doesn't it - is he a compulsive hooker or something?

Have not seen sufficient of him to verify that. But I suppose it appears obvious. I saw footage of his 240 odd for the Vics and there were very few horizontal bat shots. He did hit some sublime drives in the V tho. Almost Ponting like. Looks to have a big future.. providing he can overcome these mental issues.

The reports are the mental issues are due to the concussions. 7 is plenty... Especially 4 when in teenage years... Brain is still developing then...

Those whacks as a junior must have created acute trauma for Puck. Then to be hit three times as a senior.. does not help his mental state. Perhaps do away with the hook and pull. It worked for Steve Waugh after which he developed real steel in his game and finished a great.....

You have not commented on the team Paddles. 

Another squad named. Tour match against the Sri Lankans.
Cricket Australia XI:  Joe Burns (capt), Kurtis Patterson, Scott Boland, Jake Doran, Jon Holland, Marnus Labuschagne, Michael Neser, Will Pucovski, Jason Sangha, Matt Renshaw, Chris Tremain. 

Jake Doran are they for real. Has Burns ever skippered? This is a strong tour match team..more so in the bowling. Jason Sangha joins Puck as the two next gens.

Yeah, what has Jake Doran done? Neser should not be there either. Is Burns opening in this and then opening in the test match or is Patterson going to open like he did for Australia A against India?

Not much to say - the Sri Lankan bowling is weak as hell, Lakmal may offer something in the day night test under lights with a new kookaburra - but that's rarely ever so well timed bar Faf's declaration at Adelaide two years ago...

Sri Lanka just lost their best batsman in Matthews. 

NZ has been smashing SL 6 ways to sideways - I think Aussie should succeed also. Without Matthews - they're weak in batting. They're weak in seam bowling. If Aus don't get it done - I'll laugh. :P

Australia squad for first Test against Sri Lanka: Tim Paine (c/wk), Josh Hazlewood (vc), Joe Burns, Pat Cummins, Marcus Harris, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Will Pucovski, Matt Renshaw, Mitchell Starc, Peter Siddle

https://www.cricket.com.au/news/australia-test-squad-selections-sri-lanka-series-will-pucovski-shock-victoria-marsh-finch/2019-01-09

I imagine it will be something like this...

1 Harris 2 Renshaw 3 Khawaja 4 Head 5 Burns 6 Labu 7 Paine 8 Cummins 9 Starc 10 Lyon 11 Haze

Drinks mixed by Pucovski and banana prep by Siddle...

CA XI warmup game includes Pucovski, Burns and Renshaw - prolly due to BBL:



I'd say Pucovski would need a big score in that game with Burns or maybe even Renshaw failing miserably to get a shot in the test team...

Mind you - Renshaw may just be being groomed for the Ashes in mind...

Precisely why Renshaw was picked. He smoked  513 runs..incl. three centuries during his 11 innings stint with Somerset. last year. Took the club to the top of First Division until a broken finger ended his season. Scoring big runs in English conditions is like gold for an prospective Ashes tourist.

Just when you praise the selectors for dumping dead wood and gambling on  youth..they mess it up by choosing a dud.. one of their project players that has never done anything to warrant the attention...Jake Doran.
I am dumfounded  Doran gets a tour match nod. When did he last keep? Tassie pick him as a batsman only. Why? When he only averages @28 from 32 games with a solitary ton. If they wanted to go for youth why not chooseJosh Philippe who has a ton in 8 Shield games, also keeps..  and has more talent in one finger than Doran has in his entire body.

Should have been Pierson by a country mile with Carey playing the one day matches. If not then Wade could keep and be given a chance to show his batting. And you are right Philippe should be their in front of Doran as well, heck I would take Inglis, Gotch, or Nevill as well. Yes every other wicket keeper you can think of should have been selected ahead of Doran.

No Meredith for CA 11?

Ridiculous!

So is Burns going to play in the middle order or is it between him and Renshaw to partner Harris with the tour match an opening shoot out between the two?

Is up in the air until the toss. Four are playing for three spots. Weather looks ok for two of the three days. I like day/niters with the pink ball. We go well in these games as a rule. CA should live stream it. Looking forward to it.

Burns has never captained from my recollection, Hartley, then gave Khawaja a couple of games, now Peirson.

True to form the selectors have protected the CA big money players, Siddle???? to old, never a great performer, can't catch like a good 12th man, what's the point. I prefer the CAIX bowling attack, with Cummins for Neser, Lyon for Holland.

Doran selection will be because of the Big Bash, the other wicket keepers are performing there.

Forgot to ask you Baggers about Sangha facing Richardson, I fell off my lounge chair in laughter when I saw him play the bouncer, then realised the poor kid could have been killed. A lot of glaring problems for Sangha, can't play swing and it appears he wants to headbutt the bouncer, and out the next ball. I can only imagine what SA bowlers would be thinking if they played him in the Australian side. I just hope NSW coaches realise this problem early and work with him, unlike what happened to Phil Hughes, he couldn't play short deliveries either, and the poor bloke lost his life because of it.

In case you missed this from Paddles on another thread I've bought it across for you to enjoy the article from NSW media

https://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/the-damning-numbers-that-reveal-australia-s-bowling-struggles-20190101-p50p1n.html

But it should all be familiar to you if you've read what Paddles and myself have been discussing, typical media only 2 weeks behind. Don't mention it whilst relevant, its only Sri Lanka without their best batsman, so should be easy numbers for the bowlers.

I am noticing that a lot of our youngsters struggle against the short ball. Pucovski 7 concussions since his junior days, Sangha as you point out.. Jack Edwards has not looked all that comfortable on a couple of occasions. Marcus Harris .. a little older than the others.. him as well. Keeps getting pinged on the helmet. Ponting says it is a case of  not watching the ball to the last second before evading. Another example of poor junior coaching?

Have already read that SMH article. I am not denying it. Still maintain Starc is the weak link. Could he be bringing down the others? Also has 
sandpapergate" have our quicks running scared to bowl reverse. Hazlewood for one has been a fine exponent of it in the past. As you know I have maintained he should dump swing  because frankly he is not good at it. The only time he has swung the ball conventionally to good affect is during the day/nite pink tests. He can do it then..why not during the day?

These young players are being promoted well and truly before they are ready. There is a big difference between U19 pace compared to shield level pace, they're too slow in avoiding. One of these young players could be killed, and the Sangha incident against Richardson shows how little experience he has even in avoidance. They need an U23 tournament at the same time as shield. Get the talented a chance to adapt in the step up in grade, if they do well, then by all means promote them to shield, then on further if they continue to develop. Pucovski is not ready in my opinion, against Sri Lanka sure, nothing really above shield level pace, but if he does well, Ashes? Liam Plunkett can get it close to 150 as can Tymal Mills, For NZ Adam Milne can also get the pace up there. It is dangerous especially if as you said he has suffered concussion previously from being struck and that was against junior bowling.

Why would sandpapergate prevent someone from bowling reverse? The more obvious question is why since sandpapergate can our bowlers no longer bowl reverse? How much effect was the tape, that Warner "our designated ball shiner" was wearing, having. It which was questioned by SA, IMO the masters of ball tampering, they know all the tricks. I'll say it, if others are afraid to, if any team in the world has a designated ball shiner, something dodgy is going on. I don't care which team it is, all players know which side of the ball to shine is.........the shiny one! you don't need special talents to work that out. Funny since Warner was asked to remove the tape from his hand, how his "injury", the reason for wearing the tape, miraculously healed and coincidentally Starc and Hazlewood, our "masters of getting the ball to reverse" can't do it any more, that was evident in the 2nd test SA prior to Sandpapergate. I still don't believe in coincidence. 

Hmmm SA accuse him of tampering with those bandages on Mar 11... Warner denies it. Then sandpapergate two weeks later... Post sandpapergate no reverse swing for Starc and Josh... the irony is - Warner is the eldest and would typically be the first to retire and the write the bio - but I can see him joining t20 tours post Australia rep days...

I thought about it Paddles and I do believe that the reason Starc and Hazlewood have been poorly performing, is that Australia is missing their designated ball shiner, they don't know which side to shine.

Surely if that is case it is more than they don't know which side to rough up or how to do it without getting caught.

Don't joke about this!

 A few off air, in the know, claim this is why they are struggling - not having illicit ball tamperers working on it.

Not joking about it. Smith and Warner have been doing this for years. Daryl Harper picked up on it at a Sheffield Shield game and reported it, yet nothing was done by CA. This makes you wonder if Starc and Hazlewood have been getting an unfair advantage over others even at shield level? Did they get selected to the Australian side based on their ability to bowl with a tampered with ball? Another question is we have all played cricket, and if you were a batsman would you ever bring sandpaper out without telling your bowlers first to see if it was OK. As a batsman I doubt I would really know what a bowler would like the ball to look like to get reverse, and I definitely wouldn't do it without telling the bowlers first just in case I made the problem worse. And here is the article that shows that they have been prepared to tamper with the ball to get it to do something since 2016, and that's just when they were caught, how long prior? Starc and Hazlewood have led the attack since Nov 2015, forget the tears from Smith, he was unapologetic back in 2016.

https://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/the-email-that-shows-umpires-had-raised-concerns-about-smith-and-warner-before-20180329-p4z6xh.html

Also note the whinge about "the quality of pitch" when you just got a public spanking by a shield team that obviously had no problem with the pitch, they got a result in 4 days. Another thing Australian players fall back on when they lose.

Maxwell, Maxwell, Maxwell. Pick up a paper and that is all you read. Is becoming tiresome. Langer says Maxie has been notified where he stands in relation to a test spot. I expect that is to produce more consistent runs. The enigmatic Victorian is evidently taking things into his own hands by playing some cricket in England prior to the Ashes. One red ball game and five white ball games. Perhaps Maxie you should have tried reversing that by playing 5 red ball games. Or as many as time allowed.  Other than Maxwell bleating about being left out of the Sri Lanka series , Ashton Agar has reportedly been questioning his continual omission from any national sides. Now this is a bloke that should be jumping up and down and tearing out what little of his hair remains. He, believe it or not has a central contract, yet what national cricket has he actually played over the past 12 months? Sweet fanny all. Thats what. 

being number 2 redball batsmen in the country is surely consistent enough

it doesn't matter that he's not as good as we used to have. He's better than most we currently have

Did you forget the time where we stopped Maxwell from playing red ball cricket because he was told he'd feature for Australia and we left him rotting on the reserves? Or whenever it is time for some red ball cricket he gets called up for ODI's and T20's for the country. Not his problem Cricket Australia keep screwing him around, its a disgrace.

Agar has been screwed around just as much. At lease Maxie gets games for his country. Agar is now the one rotting on the reserves bench.

Now we hear Agar will miss further chances to don Aussie colors as he has surgery for a badly broken finger. 

In further news that should please Mike no end, Josh Hazlewood will be missing from our attack for the Lankan two tester. Josh is suffering from the early stages of a stress lumbar injury..the same injury that has floored Nathan Coulter-Nile, Jason Behrendorff and even Peter Siddle. The puzzling thing is why? This injury usually inflicts boys before their bodies have fully developed.. not mature bowlers.  Can we blame our so called sports scientists at CA as name me a mature bowler in past decades that has suffered this injury.  Comments.

I've seen him bowl balls at 149 kph in ODIs.

Does he play FC cricket?

I've never seen him in the Kiwi Test team.

Great stats to read, Mike!

Thanks for posting it.

Very, very interesting comparisons.

The strike rates are interesting.

When Lyon bowls so many overs as a stock bowler, it doesn't as matter as much that he is taking balls every 75 balls if the runs are kept down. Alarmingly, Hazlewood at 73, is poor for a paceman. He is using a lot more energy.

I've read all about strike rates over the years. Most of the top pace bowlers had strike rates about 50 -52 over the duration  of long careers.

Warne had  a SR at about 58. Hover, he bowled more overs, and averaged only about 2.5 runs per over.

Cummins is very good ATM at a SR of 43.

Starc at 62 SR isn't that bad.

All this data comparing bowlers over the world over a year makes for interesting  reading. I think the current selectors are rewarding  reputation, name and potential more  with the bowling group.

The local press is angy about Wade's non-selection with so many runs scored this season and an average of 60 plus in the Shield.

I'm delighted Renshaw has been selected again - bit it is probably based on potential rather than peprfmance in this year's Shield. I think has has good technique ( according to experts I know) and bats time well under pressure. Outside Smith, I think Renshaw is potentially the best batter  we have. He has played some dogged innings in Asia.  

I'd have preferred t the deletes to wait until after the tour game, and see how Meredith's extreme  pace compares to military medium Tremain and Boland against Sri Lanka.

Why hasn't Michael Neser been thrown in as an all rounder? He has performed in the Shield this year with bat and ball.

DC Renshaw has been picked with the Ashes in mind. As I posted earlier he tore County cricket apart last year with his stint for Somerset. 

In my opinion Neser is no where near an all rounder. His bowling is not even first class. He is on the improve tho..specially with the bat.

Neser has not done anything special with the ball this season, but he is in the match in Hobart.

I thought they were having an Aus A 11 next week at Bellerive against Sri Lanka , before they selected the squad?

Perhaps that would have been a very good idea although the Sri Lankans are not exactly the toughest ever opposition.

Their bowling is quite weak although Lakmal did destroy the New Zealand top order in one innings of the recent series. Even their spinners seem to be quite poor.

Paddles is also correct that they have lost Matthews and the rest of their batting is nothing special. Chandimal is quite good, although maybe not in Australian conditions. Karunaratne is a decent opener but they have no one to pair with him. The squad also has 5 wicketkeepers in it. 

A CAX1 DC tour warm up match. Australia A is a different squad altogether. I can understand why you are confused. CAX1 sides usually comprise next gen players. Not this one next week.

bouncing off the pitch is a different galaxy to sandpaper....

Is everyone aware the three day tour match is a pinkie? Being played at Hobart. We a should all be now aware that the First test is also a pinkie..but at the Gabba. The Gabba..Australia's paciest track. Wth the red ball hooping all over the place at dusk added to the pace and bounce of the Brisbane track..the centre strip is going to be no place for the faint hearted. Should be a great spectacle.

  Four into three does not go. So on Jan I7 in beautiful downtown Hobart Joe Burns, Matt Renshaw, Marnus Labuschagne and Will Pucovski will go head to head for three batting spots in the First Test. Promises to be an intriguing tussle.

Jhye Richardson has been selected as Hazlewood's replacement, a good move although Tremain should be in the squad ahead of Siddle. Probably Siddle will play and he might do quite well against the weak Sri Lankan batting line up and then take his place in the Ashes squad.

Patterson must be added to the test squad after his performance in Hobart.
Then we could play 
Harris, Burns, Khawaja, Head, Patterson, Labuschagne, Paine, Cummins, Starc, Richardson, Lyon
This would be a reasonable team although Labuschagne should be replaced by Maxwell or Wade.

Tremain definitely has to be the next cab off the rank. A like for like replacement.  Richardson is a massive talent so have him in the squad so he can feed off the mentors.

I have always pushed Joe Burns cart. Unless he makes an irresistible case in these two tests..he is not on the plane to England. His two dismissals in this game still spell of a loose technique and impatience. Labuchagne on the other hand has the makings of a good Test batsman. Has a more solid technique than Burns.

Tremains just another on the Maxwell, Patterson, Burns etc list who get hard done by. Richardson is a huge talent but only has 11 FC games. Tremain is 27 and in the peak really of his career with 52 first class games and a brilliant average but CA has obviously identified something lacking in him and prefer the new shiny thing (see Harris, Pucovski). 

That said Id rather they play Richardson than Siddle to replace Hazlewood. 

The odd thing is I dont think they have much of a pecking order or if they do the criteria changes frequently. They had Doggett and Nesser for the Pakistan series

I can understand this "something lacking" in Tremain 12 months ago. Evidently Tremain was slacking it and was told by CA in no uncertain terms that international cricket needs 100% commitment. Tremain said in an interview that he had been training for a nine month season as he did not see a test bowling spot for him any time soon. So for him to have been selected in this match with a view towards the Ashes.. he has to have satisfied CA of that missing 30% commitment.

Got a bad feeling of choosing Jhye over tremain

He is lethal when confident but if he goes for runs he loses his rhthym. Needs to mentally toughen

There is little between both in Shield this year. Take a squizz at Richardson's numbers five games 27.@19... most impressive. Superior to Tremain. the thing is the Dubbo,NSW  -born Bushranger has had three solid years on the trot. That should stand for something.

No live stream!!!!

What will CAX1 be looking at before declaring? 300, 350. Should do it.

200 runs for the match for Patterson.. the perfect warm up for a test match CA.