Tenacious trio answers call of selectors

If seven days of the 2017-18 Magellan Ashes Series have yielded any truisms, it's perhaps that canning selectors before the team they've nominated has made the transition from media release to Test arena is a fraught pastime.

As more than one member of Australia's National Selection Panel has noted over the past century or so, the only certainty in accepting the role is that a majority of the country will loudly argue they can do a better job.

But even allowing for that inevitability, the outcry – and in some quarters, outrage – that met the revelation of Australia's 13-man squad for the first two Ashes Tests in Brisbane and Adelaide was notable for its immediate stridency.

Former players and current commentators vented their fury on keyboards and airwaves at the audacity of recalling 30-plus pair Shaun Marsh and Tim Paine and the elevation of uncapped opener Cameron Bancroft.

The case against Marsh was that he had been tried and discarded (or replaced due to injury) half a dozen times previously and there were younger candidates who might offer a longer-term solution to the number six batting berth that has vexed Australia for the best part of a decade.

Even though the panel's charter was to name a team they believed could win the first two Tests, not carry Australia safely into generation next.

The knock upon Paine was, understandably, built around the observation that he was not first-choice wicketkeeper for Tasmania although some of the criticism seemed to suggest his glove skills had consequently diminished like the software savvy of someone still running Windows 95.

And while the call-up of Bancroft was tough to oppose on the strength of several stand-out batting efforts culminating in a double hundred, there remained a view that incumbent opener Matthew Renshaw deserved to keep his place even though he had failed to reach 20 in six previous first-class starts.

But as much as bagging selectors with the untested wisdom of foresight is a proud Ashes tradition – as any internet search using the terms ‘labelled worst touring team ever before they …' will quickly confirm – it also carries with it an element of reputational risk.

That's because decrying the wisdom of selection judgements before a ball is bowled is rather like bagging a movie based on a list of cast members, or warning others to avoid a restaurant because you've seen what the chef just tossed into a supermarket trolley.

According to the explanatory notes in the selectors' statement that ignited such vehement scorn, Bancroft was deemed "a very talented and tough cricketer who shows a good temperament for Test cricket".

A temperament he showcased in fashioning a nerveless, unbroken opening stand of 173 with David Warner in the second innings of his maiden Test at the Gabba that swept Australia to a one-nil series lead, before expanding his repertoire in a famously deadpan media conference appearance thereafter.

Marsh was preferred ahead of other contenders for the number six job, despite having begun the JLT Sheffield Shield season as Bancroft's opening partner, because "he is a versatile player who can slot in anywhere in the batting order and will add valuable experience to the batting line-up."

An ability to sum up, adapt to and thrive in pressure circumstances such as he has encountered in both Tests of the series to date – heading to the middle with Australia 4-76 in Brisbane and 4-161 at Adelaide – where he has fashioned innings of significance and substance.

In a position that, too often in recent years, has acted as an expressway to Australia's tail.

And Paine was plucked from, if not obscurity then certainly the periphery, because his keeping skills were known to be sharp (as he showed in a first-class tour game against England barely a week prior to the first Test) and his batting was combative.

"Tim was identified as an international player a long time ago and has always been renowned as a very good gloveman, also performing well for us whenever he has represented Australia in any format," selection panel chair Trevor Hohns said in announcing the squad.

For if Marsh was able to fill the job the selectors foresaw and add some stability to the middle-order, then they needed a keeper who could lift the tempo when required in much the manner that Brad Haddin achieved with such impact in the previous Australian Ashes summer of 2013-14.

Which is precisely what Paine executed when he went to the wicket just four deliveries into today's play, with England enthused by the fall of an early wicket and keen to make steadfast that foothold only to be knocked off balance by the keeper's bold counter-punch.

Against the flow of the game where runs have proved harder to find with freedom than sunny spots in the Adelaide Oval outer, Paine and Marsh rattled on 24 runs from 23 balls faced in the immediate aftermath of Peter Handscomb's dismissal to leave England bemused and confused.

It was the sort of innings that the selectors clearly believed that neither Paine's predecessor Matthew Wade or the man he replaced, Peter Nevill, might be expected to produce in that scenario given the form they had shown of late.

And the 57 Paine delivered today has not been bettered by an Australia Test keeper in the past year.

Of course, the wisdom or otherwise of Australia's selection panel – Hohns, Darren Lehmann, Greg Chappell and Mark Waugh – can't be definitively judged until this Ashes campaign is decided, and will be furiously debated at every tweak made along the way.

But as former Test captain Ricky Ponting observed today, the rush to pass judgement in the court of public opinion before an item of admissible evidence is tendered is rarely followed by a mea culpa and a changed plea.

"I've always said that about selections," Ponting told cricket.com.au today. "It's a pretty thankless job.

"We're so used to success in Australia that if you pick a team and it wins, it was just supposed to win. But if you pick a team and it loses, then you've picked all the wrong players.

"But so far, so good.

"There's some gutsy decisions there and some gusty calls, with Paine in particular.

"The other two guys deserved to be picked more than Tim did.

"But now that all these three guys have got an opportunity let's hope they can grab it with both hands and they're around this team for a long time to come."

2017-18 International Fixtures

Magellan Ashes Series

Australia Test squad: Steve Smith (c), David Warner (vc), Cameron Bancroft, Usman Khawaja, Peter Handscomb, Shaun Marsh, Tim Paine (wk), Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood, Jackson Bird, Chadd Sayers.

England Test squad: Joe Root (c), James Anderson (vc), Moeen Ali, Jonny Bairstow, Jake Ball, Gary Ballance, Stuart Broad, Alastair Cook, Mason Crane, Tom Curran, Ben Foakes, Dawid Malan, Craig Overton, Ben Stokes, Mark Stoneman, James Vince, Chris Woakes.

First Test Australia won by 10 wickets. Scorecard

Second Test Adelaide Oval, December 2-6 (Day-Night). Tickets

Third Test WACA Ground, December 14-18. Tickets

Fourth Test MCG, December 26-30. Tickets

Fifth Test SCG, January 4-8 (Pink Test). Tickets

Gillette ODI Series v England

First ODI MCG, January 14. Tickets

Second ODI Gabba, January 19. Tickets

Third ODI SCG, January 21. Tickets

Fourth ODI Adelaide Oval, January 26. Tickets

Fifth ODI Perth Stadium, January 28. Tickets

Prime Minister's XI

PM's XI v England Manuka Oval, February 2. Tickets

Gillette T20 trans-Tasman Tri-Series

First T20I Australia v NZ, SCG, February 3. Tickets

Second T20I – Australia v England, Blundstone Arena, February 7. Tickets

Third T20I – Australia v England, MCG, February 10. Tickets

Fourth T20I – NZ v England, Wellington, February 14

Fifth T20I – NZ v Australia, Eden Park, February 16

Sixth T20I – NZ v England, Seddon Park, February 18

Final – TBC, Eden Park, February 21