Australia Enter Ashes Series with Transition Suddenly Imposed on an Ageing Team

The Ashes may offer one cause for celebration, but this series will also witness the Australian team host more birthday parties than Timezone in the 90s. Recent addition Jake Weatherald celebrated his 31st a day before the squad was announced. Nathan Lyon celebrates 38 the day before the Perth Test. Beau Webster turns 32 just ahead of Brisbane, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on the second day in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood turns 35 on the final day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 before January is out.

Ageing Squad Fascination Builds

For a couple of years there has been mounting fascination with the average age of this team and especially the bowling attack. It is rare to have almost every player near a Test side being over 30, aside from young mascot Cameron Green and occasional visitor Sam Konstas. But it didn’t logically follow that older age was a disadvantage: a Test team boasting a four-man attack with over 1,500 wickets between them is scarcely a disadvantage, and it stands to reason that all of those bowlers are deep into their professional lives.

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Perhaps what most amplified the discussion is that the backup bowlers over that period, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also well into their 30s. Younger bowlers have briefly joined teams – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before disappearing for years with injury, meaning there has been no clear line of succession.

Change Forced by Injuries

So far, that hasn’t mattered, as the core four plus Boland have kept on performing. Any team knows that having a batch of similarly-aged players might mean a batch of simultaneous departures, but so far change has remained hypothetical: a process that would indeed be arriving the bend when she comes, but one that had not steamed into view.

Now, abruptly, change is upon them, imposed on this Australian squad in the space of a short period. The back injury to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would probably only sit out the opening match, was the team management assessment, and as the first-change bowler behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could easily be covered for by Boland.

But now that Hazlewood has gone down with a hamstring strain, the balance undergoes a much more significant shift with two players absent rather than a single one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two tight-line right-armers give the balance and control that allows Starc’s left-arm speed and movement to be used more as a weapon of attack. Missing both of them means a major adjustment in the composition of the side. Boland handling the new ball is nothing new in his first-class career, but he has been so effective in Test matches coming on after seven to eight overs of early pressure. Now he’ll probably have to be the man up front.

Debutant Faces Pressure

Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at 31 years old himself won’t be an overawed youth, but he might become an nervous thirty-one-year-old. A full stadium crowd, partly English, for the first Test of a eagerly awaited Ashes series will not make for an simple first match, no matter how many newspaper profiles describe him as laid-back. He could be wheeled onto the ground on a banana lounge and still be nervous.

Register to The Spin

It's uncertain, it might all go swimmingly for this new attack. It might not. What is notable is how quickly Australia have moved from the surety of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the uncertainty of Starc, Lyon, and others. Who knows what new injuries the first Test may cause. Who knows whether Cummins will be good to go for Brisbane, and good to back up after Brisbane, given how tricky stress fractures can be. It's uncertain how long Hazlewood might be sidelined, with a history of going down early in tournaments and a history of initially small injuries becoming extended absences.

Future Unclear

The latter part of the contest may see the main four bowlers reunited and all going well. Or it might experience transition setting in much earlier than the long-term aim of 2027 in the UK. Not through Neser, who is apparently next in line and could be a excellent pink-ball Brisbane choice, but after that with choices uncertain. Sean Abbott was in the original team, though he’s now also injured and has not yet played a Test match. Richardson has just had his crash-test-dummy arm repaired, and this level is not the place for easing into one’s work. Beyond them lies the true uncertainty, and throughout it opportunity for the opposing side. You can hear that change a-coming, coming around the corner, and England hasn't seen the sunshine since they don’t know when.