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After averaging 63 in the Ashes series David Warner has hit the wall in the limited-over formats.
In the five ODIs against England, where Warner is ranked world number three behind Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers, he averaged only 14.6, and last night at the SCG the drought continued, with just six against the Kiwis in the first of the T20 series.
Averaging just 13.17 in six digs is very un-Warner-like for one of the most dynamic and positive batsmen in world cricket.
Last night it didn’t matter as the Australians cruised home by seven wickets over the Kiwis, but Warner must get back among the runs for his own wellbeing, with the four-Test series against South Africa in the Republic immediately following this series.
Billy Stanlake, Chris Lynn and Glenn Maxwell combined for the easy win, and Stanlake was so impressive that he walked away as man of the match.
Using his towering 204-centimetre frame to deliver 150-kilometre-per-hour missiles to great effect he was on a hat-trick with his first three deliveries of the game.
Back in the shed were Colin Munro and the classy Martin Guptill, with Tom Bruce avoiding the hat-trick. Stanlake finished with 3/15 off his four with 15 dots and only one four.
Strangely last night was only Stanlake’s second T20 international to go with two ODIs and just two Sheffield Shield games for Queensland, the last in December 2015. Very odd.
(Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
Andrew Tye was the perfect pace partner, with 4/23 off his four, 11 dots and just one six.
In a rare appearance of two spinners in an Australian T20 line-up, Ashton Agar and Adam Zampa more than played their part. Incredibly left-armer Agar’s 1/22 didn’t include one boundary, while leggie Zampa’s 1/21 gave up two sixes in the Kiwis 9/117, where Ross Taylor (24), Tom Blundell (14), and Colin de Grandhomme (38) were the only Kiwis to reach double figures.
With Warner and debutant D’Arcy Short early casualties after rain, chasing 95 off 15 overs under the Duckworth-Lewis was left to the master blasters Lynn and Maxwell to seal the win.
Lynn’s 44 off 33 included six fours and a six, with similar figures for Maxwell – an unbeaten 40 off 24 with five fours and a six.
All that success came with no Aaron Finch, world ranked number two T20 batsman, who was still suffering from hamstring problems.
Australia remains number seven in the world T20 team rankings but has a look of building a genuine World T20 Cup bid. Even if Steve Smith remains on the T20 sidelines a line-up of Warner, Finch, Short, Lynn, Maxwell, Marcus Stoinis, Alex Carey, Agar, Pat Cummins, Andrew Tye and Billy Stanlake could well be T20 World Cup winners in 2020.
In the meantime Australia has hit the ground running, with England next up in Hobart on Wednesday.