Australia v West Indies, 1st Test, Adelaide, 17-21 January, 2024

This is not a day/night Test (Brisbane has that honour in the 2nd Test).

I guess the main talking point is who replaces the retiring Warner. Smudge apparently is very keen but Bancroft's numbers suggest he deserves a go.

Will be interesting to see which way the selectors go.

Also ScoBo to be given a go?

skully wrote:This is not a day/night Test (Brisbane has that honour in the 2nd Test).

I guess the main talking point is who replaces the retiring Warner. Smudge apparently is very keen but Bancroft's numbers suggest he deserves a go.

Will be interesting to see which way the selectors go.

Also ScoBo to be given a go?

not unless an injury occurs.

Not unless it looks like a super autobahn and Haza pulls out. ScoBo should have played in Melbourne.

Are the Tourists getting a practice match?

horace wrote:Are the Tourists getting a practice match?

Playing a CA XI
 

Jayden Goodwin , Teague Wylie and Liam Haskett are the wozzies selected

embee wrote:

horace wrote:Are the Tourists getting a practice match?

Playing a CA XI
 

Jayden Goodwin , Teague Wylie and Liam Haskett are the wozzies selected

I've heard of one of them....I'm guessing Jayds is Murray's son or possibly nephew?

That's not a bad squad - should provide a fair hit-out. Is Handy's appointment as big cheese a 'thanks for your efforts over time in an 'almost-made-it' career', or do they still have him in mind to fill any coming leadership vacuum after Ooze, Lyon, Smith and maybe a fast bowler or two follow Warner out the door?

Head and Green (and Marsh, sorry Horrie) would be ahead of him? Not sure Carey will still be in the team when Cummins finishes up …

son of Murray

basically a squad of blokes not in the Babel ...or not first team choice in the Babel

I suspect they will name a squad of 13 tomorrow or Tuesday … deferring the difficult decision until the first day of the Test.

Khawaja
Bancroft
Labuschagne
Smith
Head
Marsh
Green
Carey
Starc
Cummins (c)
Hazlewood
Boland or Morris
Lyon

What about opening with Smith and having both Bison and Snot in the middle order. Marsh has certainly earned the promotion from 6 to 5, and Green can another go as the anointed Aus Test allrounder.

So:

Ooze
Smudge
Labia
Blow
Bison
Snot
Mariah
2nd
Koo
Elmer
Haze

Personally, I'd rest either Koo or Haze and give ScoBo a go.

I really hope they don’t put Smith to open.

lardbucket wrote:I really hope they don’t put Smith to open.

of all the suggested solutions that is the worst

Lots of chat in the rags this morning about Bancroft's 2021 "self-explanatory" comment regarding the Aus bowling quartet's knowledge of the sandpaper ploy in South Africa, and suggestions that the 4 don't want a bar of the Wozzie opener.

We know from JL's demise that player opinion matters. Interesting.

Correct. For the last 6 weeks or more there has been incessant media chatter distracting or diverting attention from the best performing opening batsman in Australia for the last two years.  The media has essentially presented a series of reasons to choose Anyone But Cameron Bancroft, with the hands of Warner, Smith and Cummins as transparently behind the propaganda war as they were when the ageing and apparently buried Paine story broke.

Roughly in order, team management and/or spokesmen have endorsed as "Warner's best replacement": Renshaw, Harris, Head, Labuschagne, Green, and Smith. "Just not Bancroft" has always been the subtext.

The message sent if/when Bancroft is not even chosen in the squad is that it no longer matters how well you perform in FC cricket, it matters whether you are "in" with Captain Pat, Smith, and the Dubber-centric media. If he's left out, it's pretty poor. it was poor when Harris was chosen over him for the England tour last year, for reasons transparently beyond form even then.

The Warner acolytes - in particular Toxic Piece of Crap - have now weighed in again, the latter with his usual high pitched ignorant whine.  He's just another mouthpiece for Cummins and Smith, and the media is happy to put his rubbish out there ... as it always was (just ask Simon Katich). Smith is of course complicit in the farce and it is not hard to see why he (Captain Sandpaper) has - after Renshaw and Harris failed to press for the place - nominated himself to take the place that Bancroft seems to most fans (recent poll) to have earned back on merit.

AS you said recently...the thick plottens.

lardbucket wrote:I really hope they don’t put Smith to open.

according to media, it looks likely

I can't believe you put together a conspiracy theory which included damn near every player in the team, EXCEPT your favorite villain Carey

They prop up Warner for about 27 years while he averages 10 (SBM maths) because they're shit scared of him blowing the gaffe - at the same time excluding Bancroft for the same reason.

And why haven't the 12 Foot Lizards trotted out 'walking opinion' Uzi for his ten cents worth, seeing as he will be batting with the new bloke and already has shown regarding a dozen different issues he couldn't GAF what the SBM and talkback illiterati think?

Appalling.

Looking increasingly like Smudge is the man for GSC's spot, with Snot to return to the XI to fill his spot.

Fox, Ch7 and Ch 9 all reporting the same - Smudge to open, Snot for 4.

Personally, I support it. Bancroft will get a go next year once Ooze (he's 37 FFS!!) has retired.

I await howls of indignation from the West and possibly far South.

Not indignation. Despair. Utterly ridiculous.

Smith has been turgid. I hope he gets a king pair, lbw twice. He’s in no form at all and he’s unlikely to do better against the better bowlers with a brand new ball.

Can't disagree, but have you seen Bangers' strike rate? He may be topping the Shield aggregates but he's been going at a SR of 39. Now that's turgid.

Maybe the spot at the top will be the fillip for Smudge. He made 5 scores between 26 and 50 plus a 4* v Pak. Maybe he can kick on from here.

They want Green in, and they don't want him cooling his heels watching the blokes in front of him peel off 450 against a weak attack before he has to remember where he put his pads. THERE could be your 'hidden agenda'.

If Green at 4 makes twice the runs Smith did, or even the same number in half the time, and Smith as opener reaches the same level of inconsistent mediocrity that Warner managed lately, that constitutes team improvement.  I don't exactly like it either as a strategy but it's not completely Baldrick-esque.