The Aussies look surprisingly well placed for a strong performance in this series, starting with the first Test in Chennai.
There are many positive indications.
Ed Cowan and Shane Watson scored century opening stands in both innings in the last tour game. The batting folded after them in the first innings in the absence of Michael Clarke and David Warner.
Before yesterday, Cowan batted three times on tour for two 50s and a 40. It could yet be that India is the making of him. It’s a place that rewards patience, dedication and concentration, all attributes of Cowan’s.
Watson batted twice, for 144 runs off 150 balls. He might find it easier to produce these dominating innings as an opener, but those innings are positive signs.
It’s hard to imagine Watson succeeding in India by pottering around, and Hayden and Gilchrist showed that aggressive batting on the sub-continent can work. Watson has an imposing presence and needs to use that to his advantage.
Warner was without an innings in India until being passed fit for the Test, but is coming off solid form in Australia.
Usman Khawaja, if called on later, comes off a 30 and a 30 not out in three innings. Hardly world beating, but solid. The story of his Test career.
Clarke scored a century on debut in India, and as he showed yesterday, he is the glue that has held our middle order together. All of the top five apart from Phil Hughes have given cause for optimism.
On the keeping front, Wade has scored some runs now and his glovework has been little criticised this tour. With him at six, batting and glovework become almost equally important.
While our spin bowlers have been up and down, the Aussies won in 2004, and nearly won in 2001, with a formula of three quicks and a spinner.
The quicks in 2004 were Glenn McGrath, Jason Gillespie and Michael Kasprowicz, and for three of the four Tests Shane Warne was the spinner.
McGrath and Gillespie were superb, and while we don’t have anyone at McGrath’s level, I’d argue all of Peter Siddle, James Pattinson and Mitchell Starc are of similar quality to Gillespie, and better than Kasper.
So on the fast bowling front, we seem to be at a similar level to where we were in 2004. John Buchanan has come out in the press today advising the Aussies not to pick spinners for the sake of it, and that intelligent, accurate fast bowling can do the job.
Starc and Siddle seem made for this type of bowling. With Mitch Johnson and Jackson Bird in the wings, we’ve got more fast bowling depth than they had in 2004, but those three quicks played all four Tests in 2004, so depth wasn’t an issue.
Bird has only bowled 10 overs out in the middle, and Siddle a few more. Both have been economical, though wickets have been hard to come by.
Pattinson, like Bird, has only played in one game, and sent down nine overs for one wicket. Siddle is first picked, with the others vying for spots. They all offer something different.
Starc’s swing and reverse swing relies less on the pitch. Pattinson is strong, aggressive, and can bowl both orthodox and reverse swing. Johnson’s accuracy has improved and he hurries it on.
Lyon has played both games. In the more important second one, he took two wickets in 30 overs, at a run rate of 36.
Hardly world beating, but a reasonable dress rehearsal. The spinners were attacked in both games, possibly under orders from above to put them off their stride early on. Lyon has shown he can come back from this, and he’ll have to.
There’s more to lose attacking spinners hard in a Test, but expect the Indian batsmen to really go after him, to place the burden on our quicks to bowl more overs.
The Indians have done this before – ask Jason Krejza. Lyon needs to hold his nerve, and so far seems to be a pretty unflappable type.
With the bowlers being expected to bowl 140 overs in a day and a half, in hot conditions, much will be asked of those three quicks. However, we’ll have an all rounder at seven as a fifth bowling option, partly to lighten the load.
Henriques has been economical and has taken handy wickets this tour. With 25 overs and 5 for 42, he’s actually been by far our best bowler on tour, with his accurate, bustling outswingers.
This, added to a strong Shield season, meant he claimed the No. 7 slot, despite Maxwell, a second spinner, theoretically giving the team more balance.
Maxwell has only bowled four overs on tour, so he’s either being shielded or he’s not going to be picked.
If the first two games were a playoff between Maxwell and Henriques, Henriques was well ahead on points. But despite our chief selector’s claims that he knows what our best XI is, most of us are yet to be unconvinced.
At least there has been economy and wicket-taking with the bowling, plus some runs from the batsmen. Things are looking up, and maybe we’re in better shape heading into this tour than we realised.
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