Zampa to emerge from the shadows

Having spent most of the past six weeks in the shadow of the world's leading white-ball bowler, Adam Zampa concedes he'll likely have to sit in the background again for parts of this ICC Champions Trophy.

The presence of the 'Big Four' quicks in Australia's 15-man squad, as well as paceman John Hastings and spin-bowling allrounders Travis Head and Glenn Maxwell, means Zampa's chances of forcing his way into this star-studded team for their tournament opener against New Zealand on June 2 appear slim.

But while the focus of this Australian squad is the strength and depth of their fast bowlers, the leg-spinner is every chance of being thrust to the front of the queue when this three-week tournament reaches its climax.

With only three venues in use for the tournament - The Oval, Edgbaston and Sophia Gardens in Cardiff - the significant foot traffic on the centre wicket square at all three grounds should result in dry and worn-out surfaces for the semi-finals and finals.

Which is exactly what happened here four years ago when India triumphed over England in a Champions Trophy final that was played on, as former England skipper Nasser Hussain wrote in The Daily Mail earlier this month, "a raging dust bowl more like Mumbai than Edgbaston", the seventh match at the ground in just over three weeks.

"I think the general feeling is that the wickets here will slow up in the back end of the tournament," Zampa said on Thursday ahead of the first of Australia's two warm-up matches, against Sri Lanka at The Oval on Friday.

"I'm preparing for that, but I'm prepared to play every game. We've been selecting teams in the last 24 months (based) on the conditions and with the fire power we have with the ball, it's always handy to have."

Having played in 18 of Australia's 21 ODIs from his debut in February 2016, Zampa found himself on the outer last summer as the national selectors returned to the all-pace strategy that had guided them to a World Cup title in 2015.

Zampa played just three of eight matches at home and then only once on their tour of New Zealand as his state captain Travis Head shouldered the spin-bowling workload, as Glenn Maxwell had done in their World Cup campaign.

After he initially stewed at his absence from the side, Zampa has come to accept that a pace battery featuring the names Starc, Hazlewood, Cummins, Pattinson and Hastings means he will simply have to wait until the time is right.

"The way we've selected teams recently, it's just the conditions," he said. "I think if the conditions suit, which hopefully they will for me, (I'll play).

"You can see a lot of dry wickets in England as well so I think I can have a pretty big role to play in this tournament."

Zampa arrived in London this week having played an important role in his Rising Pune Supergiant's tense loss in the Indian Premier League final last Sunday, where he'd taking the key wickets of Mumbai's star batsmen Rohit Sharma and Kieron Pollard in the same over.

Having enjoyed a breakout IPL with RPS last year, which included a haul of 6-19 against eventual champions Sunrisers Hyderabad, the second-best figures in the competition's history, Zampa was expected to play a major role this year in the franchise's second season.

That was until Pune picked up South Africa leg-spinner Imran Tahir just a fortnight before the tournament began after the Proteas star, the world's No.1 ranked bowler in both one-day and T20 cricket, had inexplicably been overlooked in February’s player auction.

And when the South African out-bowled his leg-spinning partner in the opening two matches of the tournament, Zampa found himself out of the side altogether. And there he stayed for more than a month until the final four matches of the campaign, when Tahir was unavailable due to international duty.

While disappointed with his own output in the IPL, Zampa has been buoyed by the white-ball resurgence of leg-spinners, who had been expected to reach their death throes when the T20 revolution took off a decade ago.

Zampa's world-leading tally of 30 ODI wickets in 2016 was just ahead of fellow leggies Adil Rashid (29) of England and Tahir (27), while Tahir and Afghanistan's Rashid Khan also dominated the recent IPL.

"As a team, Pune had a great tournament (but) personally it didn't go to plan with Tahir being in the same squad," Zampa said.

"He bowled really well and out-bowled me in the first couple of games that we played together. So I didn't get the opportunities that I probably would have liked throughout the middle of the tournament, but it's always a nice experience.

"It's always nice to see leg-spinners doing well and there's been a lot of leg-spinners do well recently in one-day cricket with myself, Tahir and Rashid.

"So it's always nice to get confidence from those guys as well."

Champions Trophy 2017 Guide

Squads: Every Champions Trophy squad named so far

Group A: Australia, New Zealand, England, Bangladesh.

Group B: India, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Pakistan.

Schedule

Warm-up matches

26 May – Australia v Sri Lanka, The Oval

27 May – Bangladesh v Pakistan, Edgbaston

28 May – India v New Zealand, The Oval

29 May – Australia v Pakistan, Edgbaston

30 May – New Zealand v Sri Lanka, Edgbaston

30 May – Bangladesh vs India, The Oval

Tournament

1 June – England v Bangladesh, The Oval (Day)

2 June – Australia v New Zealand, Edgbaston (D)

3 June – Sri Lanka v South Africa, The Oval (D)

4 June – India v Pakistan, Edgbaston (D)

5 June – Australia v Bangladesh, The Oval (D/N)

6 June – England v New Zealand, Cardiff (D)

7 June – Pakistan v South Africa, Edgbaston (D/N)

8 June – India v Sri Lanka, The Oval (D)

9 June – New Zealand v Bangladesh, Cardiff (D)

10 June – England v Australia, Edgbaston (D)

11 June – India v South Africa, The Oval (D)

12 June – Sri Lanka v Pakistan, Cardiff (D)

14 June – First semi-final (A1 v B2), Cardiff (D)

15 June – Second semi-final (A2 v B1), Edgbaston (D)

18 June – Final, The Oval (D)

19 June – Reserve day (D)