A high-scoring shootout looms when Australia begin their three-match T20 series in South Africa on Friday.
The Proteas are fresh from hosting a slogfest series, which England won narrowly, in which conditions were so good that the average total for the team batting first was a whopping 201.
The first two matches were decided from the last ball, and in the third match England chased down a massive total of 222 in the final over. That deciding match saw an extraordinary 28 sixes launched over the short boundaries in Centurion.
If conditions are similar against Australia, the tourists may need to change tack.
Over the past six months, the Aussies have been forming a team and strategies designed to prosper at this year’s T20 World Cup being held Down Under. Because the boundaries at Australian grounds are often much longer than those in places like South Africa, England, India, New Zealand or the Caribbean, all-out attack with the bat is less successful.
Many of the slogs that just carry for six on tiny grounds elsewhere in the world end up caught in Aussie outfielda. Noting this, the Steve Smith was brought into the side at first drop instead of a hitter like D’Arcy Short or Chris Lynn.
Steve Smith (AAP Image/Dan Peled)
On most Australian grounds, a par score during the T20 World Cup will be in the 165-180 range. Smith’s inclusion seems designed to consistently reach solid totals rather than shooting for the stars in the manner of teams like England, who can find no room for Joe Root to play a similar anchor role.
But even huge totals regularly get mowed down in the Republic, as we saw in the England series, so Australia may well need to play with greater aggression.
That will be more difficult due to the absence of their quickest scorer, the injured Glenn Maxwell.
The Victorian has dominated international T20s over the past two years, piling up 1168 runs at 51 in his last 30 innings, while scoring at 9.7 runs per over. Among the top-ten runscorers in that period, Maxwell is the only batsman who averages more than 40 while also scoring at better than 9.0 runs per over.
Without the proven middle-order ballistics of Maxwell to lean upon, openers David Warner and Aaron Finch may need to take more risks in the power play. That won’t be easy against a quality pace attack of Kagiso Rabada, Dale Steyn and Lungi Ngidi.
David Warner (Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images)/>
If Australia can’t get off to a quick start it will heap pressure on Smith and an unproven middle order.
Matt Wade, Mitch Marsh, Alex Carey and Ashton Agar look likely to fill the spots between four and seven. While collectively they possess generous talent, none has yet had success in T20s. It also remains unknown whether any of them can go close to batting with the same dynamism as Maxwell.
Marsh is experienced in the middle order in the shortest format, but Wade and Carey have made most of their runs up top.
They’ll be matched up against a new-look batting line-up which impressed against England. The likes of JJ Smuts, Heinrich Klaasen, Rassie van der Dussen and Temba Bavuma are all relative newcomers.
Van der Dussen, who has made an incredible start to his ODI career averaging 71 after 21 matches, showed good versatility in the middle order. Klaasen, meanwhile, is more of a power hitter as evidenced by his brutal 66 from 33 balls in his only innings against England.
At the top of the order, Bavuma looked in great nick as he made 123 run at 41, with a swift scoring rate of 9.22 runs per over. But it is his opening partner Australia will be most concerned about.
New captain Quinton de Kock is in career-best form across all three formats. First he hammered 380 runs at 48 in the Tests against England, then 187 runs at 62 in the ODIs, before showcasing his boundary-clearing ability in the T20s.
In that latter three-match series, de Kock scored at an incredible 12.88 runs per over and launched 14 sixes. He ran amok in the power play, looking to thrash the England bowlers from ball one.
De Kock’s match-up against Australian new ball guns Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins is mouth-watering. It may well decide the series.
Expect it to rain sixes in South Africa.
JGK
Roar Guru
Ahem... as I was saying... Ashton Agar at 7 is great for us.
Cari
Roar Rookie
Having watched their three match series with England, which was edge of the chair stuff, I feel that Australia will have their work cut out to win the series. The wickets are slow and turn by the spinners is negative, in fact you could call it a bowler’s nightmare. While the grounds are relatively small the wind was a factor in boundary catches for two of the games. South Africa’s first 5 batsmen are good but after that they tend to fall away, whereas England bat all the way down and I feel that was how the series was decided.
VivGilchrist
Roar Rookie
Yeah, that’s it......
soapit
Roar Guru
so better to pick those who didnt do well in the bbl?
VivGilchrist
Roar Rookie
That’s the problem but unfortunately smacking bowlers of the caliber of Clive Rose doesn’t really indicate International quality.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
My preference for T20 is always 4 bowlers (preferably at least one who can hit a bit - Agar could perform that role) plus 2 allrounders. So if Maxwell and Mitch Marsh are both in the side I would definitely go for just 4 specialist bowlers. I've never seen the point of picking 2-3 allrounders in a side and then still picking 5 specialist bowlers and rarely bowling your allrounders as the Aussies have done way too much of in the past. Maxwell out makes that harder. Can you rely on D'Arcy Short's bowling as that 6th bowling option and pick the extra batsman? I think they need to try that at least. Picking 5 specialist bowlers is just too long a tail.
Paul
Roar Guru
as always Your explanations make a lot of sense Chris. If Langer and co are treating these games as practice matches, then this could be real value. I'd be concerned though if a guy who's done well in Oz, does poorly over in SA and loses his spot in the T20 squad. Not so fussed about the ODI squad, given the World Cup's a few years off.
DaveJ
Roar Rookie
Yes you wonder if it wouldn’t be better to share the fifth four over block between Marsh, Maxwell and maybe Stoinis if there’s room for him. But other teams seem to be doing something similar in T20 going for five bowlers and relying on the top 6 for the runs. E.g SA has Phehlukwayo at 7, who is a pretty ordinary bat. Although England and India with the likes of Moeen Ali and Jadeja, look more solid.
JGK
Roar Guru
Is Ashton Agar is our No 7 we have no chance in the World Cup. There is simply not enough batting.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
It's probably not a bad thing actually. Pick the same players that you think are the best ones to do the job in Australian conditions and just give them extra practice on the "hitting" portion of their batting, and the bowlers have to be extra accurate to be effective. So it's still good practice.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
This tour is too close to the WC, you don't want to be doing too much experimenting at this point, you want to be getting games into your main players. The main experimenting here will have been caused by Maxwell's injury. And BBL performances are rewarded, but guys like Starc and Cummins simply didn't play in the BBL because they were playing international cricket. I suspect if they were playing BBL they would have really shown they were a class above. Hazlewood came back from injury in the BBL despite having rarely played much T20 cricket at all and just looked all class compared to other bowlers around him. If these guys keep doing well at domestic level and keep getting better and better, then they may well get opportunities at some point. Especially in T20's, since the 3 format players simply can't play every single international match and T20's are often the first ones for them to get rested from (just not in a T20 WC year!)
Paul
Roar Guru
In terms of WC preparation, I wonder what's the point of this tour, based on Ronan's article? The only thing we're going to do is play a quality opposition. The SA grounds are postage stamps and Ronan rightly points out, that calls for a different style of batsman, which we don't have in the same abundance as other sides. At the end of the day though, that shouldn't make any difference come October, given the World Cups's being played in Australia. I suspect this tour might throw up more confusion for selectors, rather than helping to clarify the squad, especially if we lose, which I fully expect we will.
Insult_2_Injury
Roar Rookie
If you don't reward from domestic cricket, where does your next generation come from?
VivGilchrist
Roar Rookie
I think you are overestimating the standard of the BBL.
Kopa Shamsu
Guest
"Expect it to rain sixes in South Africa." If the "new ball guns" bowl same rubbish they did in India, specially in that last match, ya, I too expect rains of sixes. I was expecting BBL performances to be reflected in the selection bit more. Good to see wade. Wondering why none of Ellis or Wes got a nod. Their showing in BBL was very promising,yorkers, wide yorkers, slower deliveries. Not to say they would be selected for wc squad given its fairly settled. I would take this tour as experiment & would've tried them out in international arena.