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The Australian cricket team is still pretty clueless about Twenty20. That’s the only conclusion to be drawn following its early exit from the World Twenty20 in England.
“I thought our preparation was good,” said captain Ricky Ponting.
“I don’t know where we went wrong to tell you the truth.”
For a start, it is time to stop treating it like the 50-over form of the game that Australia have dominated for the past decade in winning three straight World Cups.
And show a bit more faith in specialist spinners as the slow bowlers have become a key weapon in the helter-skelter form of the game.
The sight of Brett Lee being belted to all corners by Chris Gayle showed the value of taking the pace off the ball against the game’s power-hitters.
Clearly, using the tournament to effectively let Lee work his way back to fitness for the Ashes has backfired.
His performance in Australia’s two matches has shown that speed is as likely to kill the bowling side as trouble the batting lineup.
A captain needs to truly trust a spinner to toss him the ball in the opening six overs with the field up.
But in each of Australia’s matches the first tweaker was the fifth bowler used in the innings – surely too defensive considering the blistering starts made by the West Indies and Sri Lanka.
Especially when off-spinner Nathan Hauritz, who missed the opening game, and part-timer Michael Clarke were Australia’s most economical bowlers in the loss to Sri Lanka.
Australia’s batting hasn’t been the sharpest either.
One of the downsides to their heavy international commitments is that Ponting and Clarke haven’t played that much Twenty20, never having turned out in the domestic competition in Australia.
That level and the Indian Premier League have been where most players have got a handle on the game.
Ponting and Clarke scored 38 between them from four innings in the World Twenty20.
And it isn’t like they batted at the death.
David Warner is the only specialist Twenty20 batsman in the side and the likes of Brad Hodge, Callum Ferguson and Cameron White can’t be far from selection.
The Hussey brothers’ credit points must be almost up while there could be claims for the clean-hitting Mitchell Johnson to be a pinch-hitter.
Sure Twenty20 is an unpredictable game.
And it is not the greatest disgrace to be steamrolled by Gayle and outplayed by a very talented Sri Lankan side in the bash and crash format.
But Ponting can’t escape the heavy nature of both losses.
Surely there is enough talent in Australia’s ranks to expect a better showing even without the likes of Adam Gilchrist (retired), Matthew Hayden (retired) and Andrew Symonds (sent home).
For years, the rest of the cricket world learnt plenty from the Australian team.
Now it is time to be humble enough to steal some ideas off them.
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