***Official*** Australia in South Africa 2018

[Gnske]

culturally they still haven't moved on from having 7 blokes averaging 50 or roundabouts. they can't handle having to work with decent players, which is why every home season these guys are massively overrated and every away series there are calls for their heads after a couple of low scores.

it's a mentality present even on cw in some quarters.

PPOR immediately as my texan friends would say

 

[stephen]

Other than Maxwell in for Handscomb, I think that this is the best Australia has to offer sans- Smith and Warner.

 

[Burgey]

How do you get his average below 40 first ?

Another duck in the 2nd dig drops it to 42.36

When you look at Australia having to drop Burns and Renshaw with averages of 38 and 37 something doesn't seem right.

Voges 60+

There is a weird trend here.

Watch him bat. He seems a nice bloke and all but his technique isn’t up to test cricket.

 

[Redbacks]

Victoria just seem to produce a stream of guys who excel at state level and can't step up to test level.

With their population they need to mimic what NSW do with junior development, another 2-3 prospects would make us always a much better side.

 

[SeamUp]

Watch him bat. He seems a nice bloke and all but his technique isn’t up to test cricket.

I agree. In recent times it has looked just awful.

I do remember when he first came into the team he was in form and we made due with the poor technique though.

I suppose it is a case of saying why is this the case. There have been many instances of batsmen scoring runs despite their technique.

I think Flem & Michaelm bring up good points though. To get more definitive answers about players it is time for better cricket-wickets or maybe more patience is required for players to learn their games better but that may be as a result of pitches that batsmen aren't learning to adapt and work hard for runs.

 

[SeamUp]

Victoria just seem to produce a stream of guys who excel at state level and can't step up to test level.

With their population they need to mimic what NSW do with junior development, another 2-3 prospects would make us always a much better side.

Last batting mainstay in the test team ? Dean Jones ?

To be fair to them they probably have 2 of the best 18-20 year-old batsmen in the country right now in Will Pucovski and Mackenzie Harvey. But get your point.

WA and Queensland seem to be producing good players in recent years so they are contributing.

 

[Anil]

Australia have given up on this series, haven’t they?

 

[stephen]

Australia have given up on this series, haven’t they?

Yep. 2 players with jetlag and the rest in a funk based on what happened last week.

 

[Burgey]

TOTAB is over there. He should have got into the shed and given these blokes a rocket.

 

[Shri]

Lol, Maxwell wouldn't have been any worse than the replacements.

 

[Burgey]

You’re playing for your country ffs. Have a go.

 

[social]

Watch him bat. He seems a nice bloke and all but his technique isn’t up to test cricket.

Tbf, I reckon that his technique has gotten considerably worse since he was first picked

May well have listened to all the critics, attempted to change something and now appears lost

 

[Daemon]

Tbf, I reckon that his technique has gotten considerably worse since he was first picked

May well have listened to all the critics, attempted to change something and now appears lost

Weirdly he looked much better in the SC than most other places. Got plenty of starts iirc.

 

[morgieb]

Seriously crap performance. I see why the dramas have hurt their morale, but c'mon. You're still representing your country, basically surrendering from ball one is pretty pathetic.

 

[morgieb]

Weirdly he looked much better in the SC than most other places. Got plenty of starts iirc.

He's one of our best against spin bowling, was always a chance of doing well in the SC. Many people felt he should've been a smokey on Asian tours before he was selected (IIRC).

Feels like he's doing a bit of a Hughes.

 

[Spark]

Weirdly he looked much better in the SC than most other places. Got plenty of starts iirc.

I was super frustrated with his tour of India actually. He looked quite good in most innings, but just found ways to get out. If he put together the series that he was clearly threatening to, then that could have got us over the line in the 2nd and 4th Tests.

 

[Tangles]

That Handscomb shot. Walking wicket as predicted.

 

[Prince EWS]

Weirdly he looked much better in the SC than most other places. Got plenty of starts iirc.

It's not really that weird; a lot of us who'd seen him a fair bit domestic cricket predicted exactly that. In fact if anything I was surprised he started so well at home and didn't actually score more runs in India and Bangladesh.

As a general rule I think Australia should think about playing Handscomb whenever they're thinking about playing two spinners, and ideally not otherwise: the anti-Khawaja if you will. South Africa should be a massive no-go zone for him. These obviously aren't ideal circumstances though.

 

[Borges]

What's this 'Tim Paine's injury adds to Australia's woes' on the cricinfo page?

 

[Johnners]

Copped one on his thumb yesterday when keeping up to Sayers, seems it's resulted in a fracture.