Opinion
I’ve no idea why, but the Esther Phillips song from the 1970s ‘What a Difference a Day Makes’ came into my head the other day while I was thinking about cricket.
For Australian cricket, it’s been the past three months that has turned our cricket on its head in a lot of good ways.
It’s now nearly the end of December so cast your minds back to the start of October this year.
Australia named its final squad for the T20 World Cup and all the usual suspects were there.
Probably the only selection issue was leaving out Dan Christian but otherwise, this was the best group available.
There were lots of criticisms. David Warner was out of form and had been dropped by his IPL franchise. We didn’t have any batting closers.
People questioned who would bat where in the order and whether Mitch Marsh and Marcus Stoinis should be in the team and if so, what were their roles?
(Photo by Francois Nel/Getty Images)
At the same time, Justin Langer was under pressure once again as coach, thanks to the media dredging up issues raised by players months earlier.
The one thing the vast majority agreed on: this was not a squad that was going to seriously challenge for the World Cup.
Australia was in the so-called group of death, playing alongside England and the West Indies, both of whom were expected to figure in the finals.
This was no bad thing because it would give the Test players in the squad plenty of red-ball match time in preparation for the Ashes.
Many, like me, would have been happy to see the team on the plane home after the group stages.
Still, it was depressing that a national side had no chance of winning.
Bubbling away in the background was the Ashes and the on-again, off-again nature of the planning left many dazed and confused.
(Photo by Albert Perez – CA/Cricket Australia via Getty Images
Nick Hockley was talking up the tour as though it was a done deal while more than a few English players were expressing concerns about coming to Australia at all.
Part of the Ashes discussion centered around Tim Paine’s captaincy and there was plenty of spirited debate on The Roar about whether he should even be in the side, let alone be the captain.
Then there was similar debate about Mitchell Starc, with more than a few suggesting his days were numbered, while Nathan Lyon wasn’t getting much love, especially after his early performances in the Shield. Again, all very depressing.
October was an ugly month for Australian cricket. We scraped a win against South Africa, did better against Sri Lanka, then got absolutely belted by England in the World Cup.
Will Puckovski suffered his tenth concussion, leaving all wondering who would open with Warner in the Ashes.
The Shield limped along, thanks to scheduling issues because of COVID. Thankfully though, there was cricket happening and things began to improve in November.
The Ashes tour was finalised, dates were confirmed and England announced their squad. More players started to show form in the Shield, especially Jhye Richardson, Travis Head and Usman Khawaja.
(Photo by Matt Roberts – CA/Cricket Australia via Getty Images)
In the World Cup, Australia never lost another match after that hiding by England and made the semi-finals, which led to a completely unlikely duo – Matty Wade and Marcus Stoinis – guiding the team into the final.
In the final, Mitch Marsh – the man many love to hate – played an outstanding innings to guide Australia to its first T20 World Cup.
All of a sudden, the doom and gloom of previous months was replaced with plenty of Australian ‘feel good’ and happiness… until Tim Paine’s announcement about his resignation as Australian Test captain.
In the month since then, there’s been very few negatives when it comes to Australian cricket.
Pat Cummins was made skipper and won his first Test as captain, Steve Smith joined him as a winning skipper in Adelaide, Alex Carey has slotted into the keeping role beautifully while Jhye Richardson and Michael Neser showed that losing James Pattinson to retirement did not weaken our Test fast bowling stocks too greatly.
Throw in two interesting Ashes Tests, some great batting by Warner, Marnus Labuschagne, Smith and Head, some equally good bowling from all the quicks, Nathan Lyon and Cameron Green and what started off as a rather depressing October has turned into a very positive December.
I’m very much looking forward to the rest of this Ashes series.
Australian cricket feels very positive at present and hopefully that feeling extends past the end of our summer and into 2022.
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