SPIRO: How the Australian team can win back the Ashes

One thing that should be said about the Australian cricket team that almost knocked off the South Africans at Adelaide is that this is not a side that can win back the Ashes next year.

Of course, it is important to defeat South Africa.

This will make the Baggy Greens the top-ranked side in Test cricket. But the main game for Australia, and Patrick Smith makes this point strongly in a column in The Australian, is to win back the Ashes, and then retain them.

Smith asserts, and I agree with him, that the selections so far this year don’t give anyone a lot of confidence that this task can be achieved. After the Perth Test a very radical (in my opinion) reformation of the Test squad is needed.

Let’s start with the batting. It is too reliant on Michael Clarke and Michael Hussey to rescue the side with a swashbuckling attack after the first three wickets have fallen.

Start at the top. Admittedly Ed Cowan has scored a century this summer against the South Africans. But he is so limited in his stroke play that he scores his runs, generally, at a very slow rate.

When you bat slowly you have to ensure, like Bill Lawry and Geoffrey Boycott, that you make big scores. Otherwise you tend to play the bowlers in and make it difficult for the other batsmen when they come in.

I put Cowan in the class of a Michael Atherton, the sort of player who might save the odd game with his dogged batting but is generally unlikely to win Tests.

Before it is too late, the selectors have to try out a David Warner – Phil Hughes combination. At number 3 probably a fit Shane Watson. Or a Watson – Hughes opening pair with David Warner at number 3.

At number 4 in the batting order the class of Ricky Ponting, our second best batsman after Don Bradman, needs to be matched with another player of potential class. The most likely candidate here is Usman Khawaja.

Clarke and Hussey round out the batting list. It is a list with some talented strokemakers, an all-rounder (Watson) if they can keep him fit. And a couple of bits-and-parts bowlers in Clarke and Warner.

I just can’t see how Ponting can expect to play a significant role in the Ashes series in 2013 given his recent form and his age, 38. No matter what happens at Perth, he needs to bite the bullet and end his Test career.

There are mixed signals coming from the selectors. On one hand, they are saying that Ponting’s position has not been considered. And then, as an after-thought, they are saying that Perth is crucial for him to remain in the team.

Adding to this curious situation, there is the problem (in my opinion) that Rob Quiney is still being considered as the next batsman back in the side, ahead of Hughes and Khawaja. Quiney can bowl some innocuous medium-pacers and this is an attraction for the selectors.

This sort of thinking leads to the English disease, the selection of mediocre bits-and-pieces players ahead of genuinely talented players who either just bat or bowl.

The issue of the wicket-keeper remains open, in my view, following Matthew Wade’s poor display behind the wickets at Adelaide. There is no going back to Brad Haddin because of his age. But consideration has to be given Tim Paine, a neat glove man and an excellent batsman.

Nathan Lyon is the only spinner worthy of consideration, and he has earned his place as the youngest spinner to reach 50 Test wickets.

The rest of the bowling is a lottery. Peter Siddle, for all his heart and energy, is not the pointed end of the attack in the Lillee/McGrath mould. He is the obvious third pace bowler, who cuts the ball more than swings it.

Ben Hilfenhaus is just too predictable with his banana out-swingers delivered from same spot and at the same speed ball after ball. He is, like Siddle, more an old-stock bowler, rather than a leader of the attack.

James Pattinson is out. Patrick Cummins is out. Either or both of these young lions, if they are available, should lead the attack. And if they are on the field, you would put money on Australia coming close to winning the Ashes back.

Pattinson, who has opened successfully  in club cricket, has the potential to be the consistent all-rounder the team needs to replace the injury-prone Shane Watson in this role.

I would make a point here that Cricket Australia needs to listen to fast bowlers like Lawson and Brett Lee about the need to get the bowlers out of the gym and on to the practice pitches and more match play. There is something very wrong with the preparation of the fast bowlers with so many of them breaking down so often.

But if Pattinson or Cummins are not available, or if only one of them is available, there is the need for either two or one other strike bowlers.

Mitchell Starc is probably the first strike bowler to be given a chance to entrench himself. And, as Geoff Lawson often points out, Doug Bollinger needs to be kept in the frame. Bollinger (aged 31) hasn’t played Test cricket for two years. But when he was dropped he’d taken 50 wickets in 12 Tests at an average of 25.

Like many other pundits, I am very wary of the claims of Mitchell Johnson. He does well at Perth but there are mental and mechanical problems with his bowling that means he will never have the consistency you need from a front-line bowler.

The point about all this is that good selection is about 90 percent of success at the international level. Alan Jones, a very good selector for the Wallabies, always made the point that the key to good selection is achieving the correct ‘shape’ of the side.

By this he meant that the parts of the team, the line-up, had to have a coherency that would enable the side to confront and defeat many different situations.

There is no identifiable shape to the current Australian side, which suggests to me that right now the team is in a bad shape to win back the Ashes.