Aussies out to defy rankings

The fifth-best team in world Twenty20 cricket has touched down in Dhaka with the express purpose of proving the folly of such a ranking and ending a search for the silverware that has eluded them now for seven years.

Australia captain George Bailey was emphatic earlier this summer in stating that success in this eagerly-anticipated T20 tournament was “the only thing that counts”.

The Australians have reached the tail-end of a hugely successful but exceptionally draining summer, which began in India more than five months ago and concludes back on the Subcontinent direct from Johannesburg, where the T20 side made it five wins from as many matches to ensure they head into the format’s showpiece event with justifiable confidence.

The form of the Australians hasn’t gone unnoticed, with bookmakers scurrying to install them as outright favourites for a trophy that has changed hands four times (India, Pakistan, England, West Indies) since it first became up for grabs in 2007.

But Bailey was quick to point out at a packed press conference at the team hotel that three of those sides – India, Pakistan and West Indies – would have to be negotiated before Australia can even think about getting out of the opening phase of the tournament.

“We’ve got a very challenging group, no doubt about that,” he said. “So certainly the way we’re looking at it is, if we progress through the group, we’ll be playing some very good T20 cricket.”

While the Tasmanian didn’t go as far as to say this is the best T20 side to represent Australia at a World Cup, he was prepared to state that it offered more versatility than any of its predecessors.

Bailey highlighted his side’s under-rated pace attack, which has happily faded into the background in recent times in the face of a batting order brimming with explosive talent.

“As far as balance goes, I think it’s probably the team that gives us the most options in terms of batting and bowling that we’ve ever put together,” he said.

“Whether it’s our best team, I guess we’ll find out in the next few weeks.

“I’m really happy with our pace battery. One of the important things in Subcontinent conditions is to either have really good pace, or to have guys who swing the ball. With the addition of Doug (Bollinger), along with Mitchell Starc and Nathan Coulter-Nile, I think we’ve got three guys who bowl at really good pace and can all swing the ball, so that’s really important for us.

“The other thing is, you have to be able to finish at the other end too, and those guys have all got really good skills at the death.”

To the uninitiated, Dhaka – the eighth-most populated city on the planet – can immediately suffocate and overwhelm, with chaos the accepted norm on the traffic-jammed streets and a heavy presence of gun-toting security maintaining a reassuring, or alarming, presence outside the team hotel.

The skipper was having a little each way when it came to how the playing conditions would impact on his side’s performance, particularly with several of Australia’s games beginning at 3.30pm local time.

Asked if Asian sides held a slight advantage in Bangladesh, he replied: “I would imagine so, and that’s not selling any of the western countries short; that’s the nature of it … playing in your own conditions, there’s a comfort there, and there’s a knowledge that it might take teams a little bit to adjust to.

“Having said that, I think we’ve played a lot in India, and I don’t think the conditions will be much different from that, so it’s not going to be altogether foreign for us.

“We’ve spoken to Brad Hodge a bit, who has played here. We’ve watched a couple of the qualifying matches that have been played so far. It does look like the wickets change a little bit from day into the evening, so we’ll have to try and adjust to that.\

“Our practice game (against New Zealand) starts in the afternoon and heads into the early evening, so we might get a bit of a feel for how the conditions do change, and we’ll certainly try and adjust to that as quick as we can throughout the tournament.” 

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