Strong Siddle ready to strike

For Peter Siddle, the path back to Test cricket began to take shape just days after fatigue and a decline in bowling speed brought him temporarily to the end of the road as a member of Australia’s first-choice pace attack.

In the wake of his team’s emphatic loss to South Africa in Port Elizabeth last February - their first Test defeat from eight starts - Siddle’s lack of velocity and penetration with the ball was deemed a contributing factor.

As a result, the trusty workhorse of a bowling outfit that had remained unchanged throughout the preceding Ashes whitewash and into the series against the Proteas that would decide the world’s top-ranked Test team was spelled from the pivotal final Test in Cape Town.

Taking his place was fresh young colt James Pattinson, who played his part in Australia’s last-gasp win and resultant (if brief) rise to the rank of best Test team in the world.

Having been sidelined from such a significant occasion, Siddle immediately sought out coach Darren Lehmann to better understand the reasons behind his exclusion and begin plotting a program to remedy those shortcomings.

“To miss out on a Test match is very disappointing, so the first thing was to get into his (Lehmann’s) room and have a little chat about it,” Siddle told cricket.com.au.

“Go from both sides of the story, talk about where things have gone wrong or what’s going on at the moment and looking forward.

“At the end of the day it came down to being fatigued - they needed the extra pace. I’d played two and a half-three years straight of cricket, so it started to catch up (with me during) that Test in Port Elizabeth.

“It was a tough one, bowling a lot of overs and bowling a lot into the wind. It took a lot out of me.

“That was the final little straw for that series.”

The feedback Siddle received from his national coach was typically no-nonsense – work on rediscovering those couple of yards of pace that had fallen victim to the workload and the door to regaining the lost Test berth remained ajar.

Rather than returning to Melbourne to work on fitness and rejuvenation in isolation, Siddle instead took up a stint with English county Nottinghamshire before being asked to return home early to prepare for the daunting schedule the Australian team faces over the next two years or more.

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“Going to England, even though I did play a lot of cricket, I was able to think of a few things to be able to work on - get a bit faster in my run-up, hit the wicket a bit harder, just little things I know I need to improve on to get back to where I was,” Siddle said.

“With those little improvements on the field with what I’m doing off the field, with the weights, doing a real pre-season, something I haven’t done for over three years, those little things help.

“By the time the season starts again I’ll be back to where I want to be, a little bit of extra pace, and still bowling with that consistency I have over the last couple of years.

“Just get the pace back up and I think everything will be okay.

The fact that Siddle had worked closely with Test bowling coach, and former Australian strike bowler Craig McDermott several seasons ago to fine tune his action and be better able to swing the ball both ways as well as gain movement off the seam means he hasn’t required any technical alterations.

After all, those changes had enabled him to become the most successful bowler during Sri Lanka’s three-Test series in Australia in 2012-13 (with 15 wickets at less than 17) and then Australia’s second-highest wicket taker on the Ashes tour of the UK the following winter.

What’s more, he currently sits 15^th on the list of all-time Australian Test wicket-takers with 188 scalps, and all those above him are members of the celebrated 200-wicket club.

Instead, he’s been concentrating “on getting the bum and legs stronger - as a fast bowler it’s what you need” and preparing himself for the extreme heat expected in the United Arab Emirates for the upcoming two-Test series against Pakistan later this month.

With Pattinson (back) and Cape Town hero Ryan Harris (knee) absent through injury, Siddle is expected to resume his role as the grunt man of Australia’s pace attack while Mitchell Johnson and possibly Mitchell Starc will be likely used in short, sharp spells.

“We’re all fit and strong and feeling good, so I think it’s just exciting,” Siddle said ahead of boarding a flight with his fellow Test squad members on Saturday to travel to the UAE.

“We want to be the best team in the world again, obviously South Africa pushed it back over us to take that number one ranking (during the year) and that’s what we want to be.

“So it all starts (against) Pakistan and taking on those guys in the UAE.

“Those conditions have always been tough for us, always been hard work so we’re looking forward to going over there, stamping our authority and starting on a good note.”

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And even though it’s almost four years since Siddle last turned out for his country in the ODI format, the sheer volume of cricket scheduled between now and the ICC World Cup getting underway in Australia and New Zealand in mid-February and the likelihood of natural attrition has dared him to dream.

“For me it’s about getting everything right now and hopefully a spot comes up somewhere along the way in a one-day game (during the coming summer) and I can get in there and maybe put my name forward,” Siddle said.

“But even if I’m going to be a spectator, just having a World Cup at home, the first match at the MCG, a big crowd against England (for that tournament opener on February 14) - what more can you ask for?

“It’s going to be amazing.”