by bigfluffylemon » Wed Feb 22, 2017 10:35 pm
Utterly ridiculous to go in with Marsh as a second seamer and drop Hazlewood for a third seamer, IMO. Hazlewood is one of the top quicks going at the moment. Even if there's nothing in the wicket for him, you can rely on him to be accurate and give nothing away, help keeping the pressure on and the scoring rate down.
Cannot understand Australia's continuing obsession with playing the Marsh brothers in test cricket. For a while I thought it was nepotism (dad on the selection panel), but he's gone, and they're still there.
The pitch reports are claiming a rank turner, but honestly, does anyone think Ashton Agar and Mitchell Marsh would be better than having both Starc and Hazlewood in the side?
And btw, Starc is a pretty solid number 8. Test average of 25 with 8 50s in 34 games (that's more 50s than Jadeja). Jadeja is probably better. But by no stretch is Starc a weak number 8.
Ashwin at 7 and J Yadav at 9 for India on the other hand will be much stronger than Wade and O'Keefe for Aus.
I'd say Hazlewood and Lyon are better than Ishant and U Yadav with the bat, but when you're getting to numbers 10 and 11, it doesn't really matter. Best you can expect from any of them is a 30 and hanging around long enough to be annoying.
If I were Australia, I'd be very worried about the lower middle order. Marsh, Handscomb, Marsh, Wade is not a line-up to inspire confidence.