The history of childhood prodigies in Indian cricket means heāll either:
(1) Be an all-time great batsman, one that we talk about in 40 years as in the conversation of greatest to have played.
(2) He plays about 6 international games before being dropped and never heard of again.
There is no inbetween.
^^ THIS ^^
Which beckonsā¦ the Sachin Teundulkar pathway, or the Prithvi Shaw pathway?..
Would a 14y.o. be allowed to play first class cricket in Australia?
Doesnāt feel quite right to me. Main concern being exposure to the fastest bowlers going around.
He faces Jofra Archer in the nets for Rajastan and pumps him all over the place. Reckon heād be pretty comfortable handling Nathan McAndrew and Jackson Birdā¦
Heās gone out and scored the 2nd fastest IPL hundred of all time in only his 3rd match. Heās not your average 14y/o kid.
Yeah, if you are good enough you can play at any age. Iāve seen some decent 14-15 year olds play Premier cricket here but for one reason or another they often donāt progress through the ranks. Many tend to go back or continue down the football pathway
A lot more opportunities to become an average AFL plodder on $300k than there are at the commensurate salary level in franchise cricket. What are we talking, probably ~500 afl footballers on ~$250-300k/year?
There wouldnāt be more than ~50 cricketers in Aus earning that. All the nationally contracted players and the top few players at each state/bbl franchise?
In other news, Ferg is leading the County Championship wickets tally after the first month of the season and thatās his stint done.
Rohit has retired from test cricket. So after dropping himself for the Sydney test he never played again in the format. Probably not surprising really. The writing was on the wall at that point.
Looks like Marnus gonna pushed up to open for the WTC Final, to help with the selection squeeze re: Green/Webster. So Konstas will miss out again and Marnus/Smith shuffle up a spot to opener and #3. Green to #4.
Still chat that Green is going to 3 and Smith 4
Iād prefer Green 3, Smith 4.
But shoehorning Marnus in as an opener? Not a fan of that.
I really wish theyād stop kicking the can down the road and address the opener issue now, rather than when we need to replace two when Usi leaves as well.
I know Konstas hasnāt had great form in the shield but he was the incumbant, excluding the horses for courses strategy with Head.
Perhaps this sneaks us the Test Final, but it delivers the Tsatas treatment onto Konstas and robs him of one Test match, one Test match which probably delivers the equivalent of 10 Test matches of experience if you go by Sheedyās rule re: big matches and youngsters.
Konstas isnāt getting any greater benefit of experience from the WTC Final than he was from facing the best bowler in the world in the form of his life last summer.
Bottom line, they picked him when he arguably wasnāt ready but purely to throw off the Indianās and Bumrah who we had seemingly no answers to, in the last 2 tests of a series that we havenāt won in a decade. It worked, he rattled India for the briefest of moments and it gave us the the ascendancy in the series. But his defensive deficiencies were quickly exposed, so sending him back to first class cricket to develop and learn his game isnāt a bad idea.
Is Marnus at opener a long term strategy? Probably not.
Is it McSweeney? Maybe, but probably not.
Does Konstas need more time to learn and trust his game? Most definitely.
Expect more stop gap solutions for the coming summer as well and perhaps Konstas finds his way back into the side if things go really pear shaped and we need a circuit breaker.
I think this is just a one off test stop gap and everything Iām hearing suggests we will treat the Windies series differently and go in with a recognised opener
ārecognisedā but in what capacity?
Given what the wickets are likely to be over there, could well end up being Trav to open again.
Itād be a good opportunity to have another look at Konstas or McSweeney given the relative quality of the opposition, but really itās not gonna give us much of a look at next summer let alone the longer term future.
Unlikely I know but if Marnus shot the lights out in the WTC final as an opener, then I could see them keeping him there indefinitely to avoid making any hard calls for a little while. Usman should be done at the end of the Ashes so it would avoid us having two essentially new test openers after this summer.
At this stage Trav hasnāt been āaskedā to open over there and both Trav and Carey think that the selectors are leaning towards Konstas but McSweeney is in the mix and I guess if Marnus bats well in the WTC they may keep him there but I think thatās less likely
Iām imagining theyāll want 2x quicks, 2x spinners, +Webster?
When is it expected that Green will be cleared to bowl again? Heād be ready by the Ashes yeah?
If Webster can kick on from here itād be a great result though cos itād further ease any reliance on Green to contribute much with the ball and allow him to focus on being an out and out batsman. I imagine thatās the way things are tracking anyhow even putting Webster aside.
Itād be handy to have him up your sleeve as a partnership breaker though who can send down a few overs an innings when needed.