Australia aim to end tough tour on a high

After 60 days in Sri Lanka, Australia's cricketers have one final shift to pull – tomorrow night's second T20 International before a sold-out crowd of more than 30,000 wildly parochial fans at Colombo's R Premadasa Stadium.

And having taken a front seat on the rollercoaster journey that began with buoyant expectations before descending into multiple Test failures, a resurgent ODI campaign and a brutally comprehensive T20 performance, coach Darren Lehmann knows how this trip must end.

"When it's a two-match (T20) series you've got to win both of them, so it's important for us to finish the tour well," Lehmann said today as his team undertook their final training session of what's been a draining – both physically and spiritually – nine-week sojourn.

"I'm pleased with the way we played the other night (in posting a new T20 International record score of 263).

"It was a fantastic wicket, I must give the curator real credit there, it was an unbelievable wicket. One of the best I've seen."

The toll this trip has taken can be assessed by Lehmann's confirmation that the Australians have a bare minimum 12 fit players to tackle Sri Lanka tomorrow plus 13th man Aaron Finch who is restricted to drinks carrying by dint of the fractured right index finger he is nursing.

Of the 15-man Test squad that arrived in Colombo on July 10, those who didn't make it through to the end include captain Steve Smith, allrounder Mitchell Marsh and seamer Josh Hazlewood who all returned early to Australia to rest ahead of the hectic summer schedule.

In addition, pace bowler Nathan Coulter-Nile's tour ended prematurely due to stress fractures in his lower back, Shaun Marsh broke a finger and Chris Lynn dislocated his shoulder during a fielding drill before he had a chance to play a game.

George Bailey, the best-performed batter from either side during the ODI series that Australia won 4-1, flew home from Colombo on his 34th birthday yesterday.

And Matthew Wade, who was not originally part of the T20 squad but was drafted in when Finch was injured, was ruled out of last Sunday's opening T20 International at Pallekele with a gastric illness.

Adam Voges, Joe Burns, Jackson Bird and Jon Holland (himself a late call-up as cover for fellow left-arm spinner Steve O'Keefe who strained a hamstring in the opening Test) were replaced for the white-ball component of the tour.

Off-spinner Nathan Lyon was overlooked for the T20 matches having played just one of the five ODI fixtures, and Test 'keeper Peter Nevill is currently on his second tour having returned to Australia for the ODI matches only to be recalled for the 20-over games.

Which means the only players from that initial Test squad to have endured to the end are top-order batter Usman Khawaja and allrounder Moises Henriques (who both played limited roles in the Tests and ODIs) , and pace bowler Mitchell Starc who, along with stand-in skipper David Warner, has played every international match of the tour so far.

Starc was expected to be spelled from the final ODI at Pallekele last Wednesday but told the selectors he was keen to play and ended up finishing the one-dayers – as he did the Test matches – as Australia's leading wicket-taker.

But given his workload over all three formats on this tour, during which he has sent down around 200 overs in matches and training sessions, he's a good chance to sit out the final fixture tomorrow evening.

And Warner must play tomorrow because in the absence of Smith, Bailey and Finch who have all captained Australia in limited-overs cricket in recent years, it would be difficult to nominate a skipper should the stand-in leader need a break.

"We've only got 12 fit, so Wade will play," Lehmann said today, confirming at least one change to the team that surpassed the previous T20 record set by Sri Lanka against Kenya in the initial World T20 tournament in 2007.

"The bowling attack we'll just have a look at the wicket and sum that up."

And while Bailey, Finch, Travis Head, John Hastings, James Faulkner and (come his opportunity in last Sunday's opening T20 where he blasted an unbeaten 145) Glenn Maxwell have stood out against the darkness of the Test match results, Lehmann is not about to be swayed by hindsight.

And the suggestion that some, perhaps all, should have been included in the original Test touring squad that arrived in July carrying high hopes but finished the series holding nothing but a raft of questions over the performance of Australian Test teams in Asia.

"We thought the side that we selected for the Test series was right, on the form and the previous matches we'd played," Lehmann said when asked if he and his fellow selectors had their time again they might include some of the white-ball specialists for the Test matches.

"Obviously, we didn't play as well we would have liked and some of the guys struggled with the conditions here and that's understandable.

"That happens sometimes. Those one-day guys have come in and they've performed really well for us and that's impressive.

"That's all you can do when there's another tour to India in February (next year), looking at the whole squad and what we take there.

"For me, we've got a pretty important home summer and it's important what sort of side we have there.

"So we'll just have a look at those over the next few weeks."