On January the 11th, 2009, the renowned Melbourne Cricket Ground was packed for what was back then a new and unknown format of the game of international cricket.
Twenty20 cricket had just washed up on Australian shores after six years of it being played in English counties. Australia were playing South Africa in a Twenty20 that was billed up to be a brilliant slogfest.
The gold and grey clad Aussies batted first, with an unknown opener walking out to the crease in his international debut.
His name was David Andrew Warner, and he thrilled the huge MCG crowd with plenty of mammoth sixes, including a few that sailed over the head of yours truly.
He powered a remarkable 89 off 43 balls on international debut, and the name David Warner became synonymous to Australian Twenty20 cricket.
For a few years he was Australia’s best Twenty20 player, but failed at ODI level and in first class cricket.
But, in late 2011, the tide changed as Warner followed up an impressive first class maiden century for New South Wales at the Sydney Cricket Ground by powering two unbeaten centuries in 72 hours in the Twenty20 Champions League for NSW.
Those innings caused magazines like Inside Cricket to interview past and current players like Brett Lee, Michael Hussey, Damien Fleming, Shane Watson and Tom Moody about the ‘pocket dynamo’.
The interviews showed how all four of them thought that Warner should be in contention for the Test team.
If one of them had said that it would have been dismissed as a crazy delusion of grandeur, but for all four players to say it shows that the players and cricketing members knew that Warner was something special.
Their thoughts came to life as David Warner debuted for Australia against New Zealand in early November, 2011 at the Gabba.
He opened and fell cheaply in the first innings, causing The Herald Sun to have some shots at Warner.
But he followed the steps of who Warner was compared to with his clean hitting ability, Adam Gilchrist, as he scored his maiden century in his second Test at Hobart.
That’s exactly what Gilchrist did in 1999, except Warner’s fantastic knock wasn’t enough for Australia to win the match, as he kept on losing partners as he finished not out in a despairingly close loss.
He scored another century against India that summer and showed how he still modelled his game around Twenty20 cricket.
But the highs ended for Warner as he was dropped for the 2013 Ashes series after some off field drama.
He didn’t come back into the team until later in the series, and sparkled in the return 2013/14 Ashes, where he scored two centuries and resurged, proving that perhaps Twenty20 cricket could produce high quality Test cricketers.
But the argument doesn’t stop there.
Steve Smith made his Twenty20 International debut for Australia on the fifth of February, 2010 at the MCG. He impressed selectors enough to make his One Day International debut just 14 days later at the same venue.
The stunning rise ended with Smith making his Test debut in July in the same year.
But the dramatic rise must have been too much, as Smith was used more as a leg spin bowler in the 2010/11 Ashes series and was dropped by series end.
The name Steve Smith was then resigned to limited overs cricket, especially Twenty20.
But two years later Smith was back, as he performed solidly in the 2013 Ashes before being billed as the next Test captain for Australia after an extraordinary 2013/14 Ashes series, where he saved Australia from collapse twice with two centuries.
Twenty20 helped the two Aussies hugging in the slips cordon just balls before their team regained the Ashes in a 5-0 sweep. Now we seem to be onto something.
The surge to fame for teammate Nathan Lyon goes along the same lines. Lyon was a curator for the Adelaide Oval before being asked by the South Australian Redbacks coach Darren Berry to bowl to his batsman.
He was mightily impressed by Lyon’s off breaks, so much so that he granted Lyon a Twenty20 debut for the Redbacks.
After a couple of steady performances, ‘Gaz’ Lyon made his first class debut, where his remarkable rise was completed in mid-2011 where he made his Test debut for Australia against Sri Lanka.
In his first ever ball in Test cricket, Lyon removed one of the best ever batsman going around in Kumar Sangakarra on his way to a first innings haul of 5-34.
But the sailing wasn’t so smooth afterwards as Lyon was in and out of the team for a good two years before nailing his position in the team after an impressive 2013/14 Ashes series, where he out bowled who was at the time one of the best spinners in the world in Graeme Swann.
Those three remarkable stories then pose an interesting and eye-opening question – does Twenty20 cricket help produce high standard Test players?
The answer may be proven by another player in George Bailey. Bailey is Australia’s current Twenty20 International captain and is the third highest ranked One Day International batsman in the world.
But his effect in his debut Ashes series was minimal, so much so that he was dropped from the squad before their tour to South Africa.
Can Bailey follow in the steps of Warner, Smith and Lyon and use his roots in Twenty20 cricket to resurrect his Test career?
Or will the experiment fail because he is already above the age of 30? Maybe Twenty20 cricket is only a sound start for younger players, and Bailey has left his run too late.
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