Out of Africa, Hilton aims to follow Kallis

When asked who - among the litany of seam-bowling allrounders that Australia has debuted and discarded in a search ongoing over decades - had served as his inspiration, Hilton Cartwright nominated one from much closer to home.

And given that the powerfully proportioned 24-year-old, who is tipped to become Australia’s 450th Test cricketer on Tuesday, was born and raised in Zimbabwe that role model was justifiably Jacques Kallis.

The recently retired legend from neighbouring South Africa who, statistically at the very least, stands head and shoulders as the greatest all-round cricketer the world has seen.

If Cartwright can get within a bull elephant’s roar of Kallis’s 13,289 Test runs (at 55.37) and 292 wickets (at 32.65) he might still lay claim as the best allrounder Australia has unearthed (if not produced) since Keith Miller quit the game 60 years ago.

A quest that has spawned careers of varying length and productivity for apparent successors including Alan Davidson, Gary Gilmour, Tony Dodemaide, Shane Watson and – most recently – Mitchell Marsh.

Cartwright is poised to add his name to that list this week, with selectors tipped to make two changes to the XI that surged to a remarkable final-day, series-deciding win over Pakistan at the MCG last Friday.

Left-arm spinner Steve O’Keefe is expected to return to the starting line-up in place of seamer Jackson Bird, while Cartwright seems likely to slot into Nic Maddinson’s berth in the middle-order and provide some bowling back-up for overworked strike pair Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood.

Quick Single: Spinners duel for Test spot

The return to a selection policy that requires an allrounder as much a nod to the workload of the front line quicks over recent weeks as it is acknowledgement of an SCG pitch carrying more grass than many expected three days before the Test begins.

But if Cartwright does get the nod for the third Commonwealth Bank Test at the SCG, he will come to the role with an acute understanding of the dual demands of combining a specialist batter's role with the responsibility of taking wickets and applying pressure with the ball.

Something that unfortunately eluded Marsh, who was a close school friend of Cartwright’s at Perth’s Wesley College as well as a teammate with the Alcohol. Think Again Western Warriors.

And who lost his place in the Test XI earlier this summer having managed just two 50-plus scores and a slightly tidier 29 wickets at 37.27 across 19 appearances in two years.

“I went to school with Mitch so I’ve pretty much played the bulk of my cricket with him,” Cartwright said today after training with the Australia Test squad at the SCG.

“He’s always been a role model in a way for me, he’s always been the year above me (at school) and he’s taken me under his wing quite a lot.

“Even when he found out I was in the squad he was one of the first guys to come up and congratulate me.

“And he’s always helped me, no matter what situation it’s been.

“I think it’s bittersweet for him, but he’s just as rapt as anyone else.

“He’s been involved for (almost) 20 Test matches now and he says it was bloody hard.

“He’s tried to share knowledge whenever he’s come back to WA, he tries to relax a bit and understand his game more and more.

“But I can see through him, how much pressure he was under and he’s actually managing it really, really well.”

Quick Single: Marsh 'over the moon' for me: Cartwright

Cartwright concedes that, like Kallis, his principal strength is batting but he has been working diligently on his auxiliary skill during the past year, particularly with former England bowling coach Troy Cooley and ex-Test spearhead Ryan Harris at the Bupa National Cricket Centre in Brisbane throughout the winter.

The right-hander admitted that up until this year, he’s employed the same bowling run-up and approach that he used during his school days at Wesley but has now incorporated much more science into what was a supplementary skill.

“I probably see myself as a batting allrounder,” he said today.

“I can definitely contribute overs during the game and that’s always been a part of my game.

“It’s always been the batting and the bowling, the bowling has been there.

“I’ve just been working to try and get it close to my batting.”

It’s been a heady rise for Cartwright, who was added to Australia’s ODI squad for last month’s Chappell-Hadlee Trophy ODI Series against New Zealand before he was a belated addition to the Test squad for the Boxing Day match.

And even though he’s yet to receive an international cap, he stands well advanced on his pre-season aspiration which was to earn a place in the Australia A team that played India in northern Queensland earlier this year.

While his bowling numbers – 15 first-class wickets at 41.93 from 16 matches – will scarcely engender fear in rival Test teams, his ball-striking ability and level-headed temperament might help solve Australia’s ongoing batting woes at number six or seven.

Where Australia have not found a consistent contributor with the bat since Michael Hussey and Brad Haddin were starring in those respective roles.

Part of Cartwright’s fearless, unfazed demeanour can be attributed to his upbringing in Zimbabwe, where his father ran a tobacco growing property an hour’s drive south-east of Harare.

Quick Single: Cartwright lauded for courage and loyalty

And where the family endured years of threats from politically motivated gangs trying to forcibly redress the racial divide brought by British colonisation before Raymond Cartwright opted to relocate his family to Perth when Hilton was 11.

Until that time, Hilton’s ambition had been to follow in the wake of players such as Heath Streak and the Flower brothers Andy and Grant (the latter now Pakistan’s batting coach) who were stars in the long-gone golden era of Zimbabwe cricket.

But upon settling in Perth, the young allrounder who carries the physique of a rugby open-side flanker was able to shrug off his previous national loyalties when made aware that a potentially more lucrative prize might beckon.

“My mum, the other day, she was telling me how when we moved over (to Perth) I said ‘oh, I can’t play for Zimbabwe any more’,” Cartwright recalled today.

“And then mum was like ‘but you can play for Australia now’, and I just flicked the switch then and there.

“I was like ‘okay, I’ll try and get a Baggy Green (Cap) then’.

“So I pretty easily convinced when I was younger, it didn’t take much.”