Country's eleven best players announced
Photo: Rob Giese
Star Western Australian opening batsman Mitch Green is among a long list of star cricketers who play league football.
Green has been a revelation at this year’s Commonwealth Bank Australian County Cricket Championships and good judges believe he has what it takes to succeed at First Class level.
Standing in the way is a promising career with WAFL club Peel Thunder and a passion for Australian Rules football that has so far discouraged him from hanging up the boots to pursue cricket full time.
The richly talented sportsman added another accolade last night when he earned selection in the Team of the Championships following a sensational country championships campaign that netted a century against Northern Territory and saw him hit the winning runs for the Australian Country XI against the ACA Masters in the Twenty20 feature match at Torquay on Saturday. Green struck a six and two fours in the final over against the collection of former Test and First Class stars.
The official Australian Country XI, a team picked to recognise the top performers from the 12-day tournament, features a rich array of talent.
Northern Territory run machine Grant Bell was picked at the top of the order with Green after a carnival that yielded 371 runs at 53.
South Australia’s Ben Smith (254 runs), ACT’s Michael Spaseski (249), WA skipper Rod Ford (246), SA skipper and all rounder Kieran Ashby (244 runs and 13 wickets) and Queensland’s Sean Fitzsimmons (242) rounded out the top seven.
Fellow Queenslander Josh McLean was selected as the wicketkeeper on the back of his 15 catches, a stumping and more than 150 runs.
Udara Weerasinghe, the tournament’s premier spinner from the Northern Territory heads the bowling after a carnival that yielded 16 wickets.
Pacemen Andrew Maher from NSW (16 wickets), Queensland’s Trent Sorohan (17 wickets) and Northern Territory’s Ben Reichstein (21 wickets) rounded out the team.
Commonwealth Bank Australian Country Championships Country XI
Grant Bell – NT
Mitch Green – WA
Ben Smith – SA
Michael Spaseski – ACT
Rod Ford – WA
Kieran Ashby - SA
Sean Fitzsimmons – QLD
Josh McLean - QLD
Udara Weerasinghe – NT
Andrew Maher – NSW
Trent Sorohan – QLD
Ben Reichstein - NT
