Whether Khawaja is fit to play or not may well play a part in the overall selection process, but it seems extremely unlikely that either Marsh brother will miss out on Adelaide on December 6th despite the usual outcry over their average form. The selectors are missing three batsmen they no doubt believe are in their best top six, and if Khawaja is also laid low that would make four of their ideal top six are not available. Shaun Marsh has been given innumerable opportunities to make a spot his own in the Test team, and at the end of last summer it looked as though he may actually have done so. Unfortunately the same scenario worked its way out again as it has throughout Marsh’s career, when a couple of good scores are followed by a plethora of failures, and mostly single figure failures. To be fair, he has once again been thrown around the batting order to fill any gap that appears. He batted in the middle order with success last summer, but again found himself as the fill-in number three against Pakistan. It is the unrelenting series of low scores that tends to get the eastern states public offside with his selection, and the fact that he appears to get more chances than most. Brother Mitch was only recently chosen as one of two vice-captains of the Test team which suggested that the selectors were confident of him holding his place in the team for the foreseeable future. He too managed to enjoy a good summer at home, but despite scoring 96 in the 1st Test in Durban in March he has managed just 109 runs from his next eleven innings. In the last two years Australia has relied on Smith and Warner to find a way to score runs to cover over the cracks elsewhere. With these two not around Australia needed the Marsh brothers in particular to score good runs to cover their absence, and they have not. The fact that they haven’t is more pronounced because of the absence of those two batsmen, and the pressure on them to do more is heightened.
While many around the country will be throwing any number of names out as solutions to Australia’s Marsh batting problems and suggesting they are the answer, there seems little chance the selectors will feel the same way. In their corner is coach and selector Justin Langer, who championed their selection last season in the media as Western Australian coach and now has the ultimate power in his hands. It seems unlikely he will turn on them at this stage having backed them so vociferously last season.
Whatever the reasons for leaving out Glen Maxwell, Joe Burns and others from the Pakistan squad, the selectors decided that the players that were sent were the best we had for the conditions at hand. Little has changed in the Australian cricket landscape since then that promotes anyone above those selected. The Shield matches coming up will provide some cause for players to offer themselves up as candidates if they can score enough runs, but if recent history is any guide then it will take an enormous amount of runs to budge the selectors thinking. The tour by India for four Tests is an important one especially as India has never won a Test series in Australia. They will never have a better chance, and it will be up to the batsmen to put competitive totals on the board to allow the bowlers to have something to bowl at. It would be a tough ask to throw more debutants into the mix, and the suspicion is that the selectors will stick with a similar batting line up for Adelaide and Perth at the very least. The selectors will be in a holding pattern, knowing that after the six home Tests this summer they will have Smith, Warner and Bancroft all available again for the Ashes tour to England following the World Cup. It seems unlikely that they will try and burn through too many selections given they know those three will be able to come back into the squad if they so desire after this summer.
If Khawaja is unfit then Matt Renshaw looks to be the ready-made replacement at the top of the order. If Khawaja does come up then the Renshaw question can be asked seriously, allowing him to come in to partner Aaron Finch and perhaps Khawaja to return to number three. This means one of the other four would miss out, which would pose a series of interesting questions. Would it be a straight swap for Shaun Marsh? Or is there really a need for two all-rounders in the team, meaning the choice of who to miss out would come between Marnus Labuschagne and Mitch Marsh? Is Travis Head’s position as secure as it may appear?
It is a long time since Australia has entered a home Test series as the serious underdog, but surely that is the case this summer. The next month of cricket, both in the Sheffield Shield and the one day series against South Africa, should be fascinating, mostly to see what we as the cricket watching public see as important compared to what the selectors decide is the best way to go.
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