With Mitchell Starc bagging 10 wickets and Australia beating Bangladesh by an innings, it seems a shame to be concentrating on the negatives, but it’s been another two-day Test match, and concerns around the team’s batting overshadow the bowling positives.
We all know how good Starc is.
Pitches may be more lively, seams may be prouder, but there is no denying Test match batting is in decline in this country, and this trembling top order needs regeneration.
Australian captain Pat Cummins said after the game that the wicket in Mackay “didn’t feel like a 30 wicket in five sessions kind of Test match, but it seems to be the way a few of these Test matches are going”. This two-day game follows hot on the heels of Melbourne and Perth’s abbreviations in the summer.
Cummins says Australia’s batters need to improve despite squaring the series.
“If we want to be number one in the world and win every Test match and be as good as we think … I think we’re probably a little below par in both Test matches,” he said.
Cameron Green and Steve Smith were the only Australians to pass 50 in the three innings against Bangladesh in the series. Marnus Labuschagne will have a lot of restless nights between now and the naming of the XI for Australia’s first Test against South Africa later this year.
“He’s not scored the runs he would have liked,” Cummins admitted.
“He’s been batting fantastically well off the field, but it doesn’t mean much. You’ve got to convert that into runs out there.”
Last week Northamptonshire announced Nathan McSweeney was cutting short his county stint and would return home in early September. The Australians play the first of three ODIs on September 24, with the three Test series beginning in Durban on October 9.