'I keep getting back up': Marsh vows to respond

Australia A allrounder Mitch Marsh says his desperate desire to succeed at Test level last summer ultimately led to his downfall and the loss of his Cricket Australia contract.

But having been through the ringer over the past nine months, the 27-year-old is confident it has made him a better leader and a better cricketer with an Ashes series just around the corner.

Marsh puts the blame squarely on his broad shoulders for a rollercoaster summer that began with him holding the dual role of Test vice-captain and incumbent allrounder and finished with him out of the national setup altogether, without a CA contract or a ticket to England as part of Australia's World Cup squad.

But his form slump during the summer wasn't from a lack of trying. If anything, Marsh says he tried so hard that he lost sight of the here and now and instead kept one eye on the next match, the next series and the next chance to put on the Baggy Green.

"I probably learnt some of my greatest lessons last summer about staying present," Marsh told cricket.com.au in Worcester on Tuesday.

"At the start of the summer I was hellbent on playing Test cricket and I wasn't necessarily as focused as I could have been playing for Western Australia. It really affected my results leading into the first Test match and affected my whole summer.

"When you have setbacks like that (losing a CA contract), I was very disappointed at the time. I have no blame for anyone else, I was just really disappointed.

"When something gets taken away from you like that, I was really hurt." 

Following a "stinker" of a Test series against Pakistan last October which yielded just 30 runs in four innings, Marsh was dropped from the Test team for the first Domain Test against India on home soil.

A return swiftly followed for the Boxing Day Test at the MCG, but as quickly as a Test recall was handed to him it was taken away, axed after scoring 9 and 10 and failing to take a wicket as the tourists won by 137 runs to take a series-winning 2-1 lead.

He did not feature in national colours for the remainder of the summer and knew exactly why he wasn't offered a CA contract.  

"Over the last 12 months 'JL' (Australia men's head coach Justin Langer) and I have done a lot of talking and I didn't really need an explanation," Marsh said.  

"Ultimately if you don't score enough runs, you don't get to play cricket for Australia.  

"I hadn't done that over the summer. There is no one else to blame. I don't have any ill feelings towards anyone.  

"It was just a matter of getting to work. I'm done with the talking.

"I just want to enjoy my cricket, work as hard as I can and earn the respect of people. Those are the things that I can control."

Out of the national selectors' crosshairs, Marsh returned home to Western Australia to captain the Warriors in the closing rounds of the Sheffield Shield.

There, in Perth, he says he leant on the likes of WA coach Adam Voges, assistant coach Kade Harvey, his family and friends to get through the disappointment of his Test omission.  

And with the help of WA's sports psychologist Matt Burgin, Marsh learned how to 'detach himself from the outcome' and prepare appropriately for the rigours of being WA’s captain. 

Marsh is quick to suggest it wasn't a turning point in his form, but in his final three matches captaining the Warriors after the BBL break, he scored a century against Queensland, took six wickets in Hobart and his side won all three contests to narrowly miss making the Shield final.

A month after his last game for the Warriors, Cricket Australia announced its central contract list for the 2019-20 season and Marsh was not on it.  

Nor was another incumbent in WA teammate Ashton Agar. Together, the pair discussed their shared disappointment over a coffee in the Perth suburb of Cottesloe and vowed to fight to get not only their contacts back but their spots in the Australian team.

What gives Marsh confidence he can rebound is precedent. 

Since his Test debut, Marsh has been dropped six times and when given an extended run, through good form and fine health, he has been a linchpin in the middle order, as he was in the 2017-18 Ashes on home soil where he scored his maiden Test century at the WACA Ground and followed it with a rapid hundred two matches later in Sydney.  

"That's just professional sport, you have ups and downs," Marsh said. "I've had plenty over the last couple of years, certainly in Test cricket and playing for Australia.

"I keep getting back up.

"I've shown myself I can be really resilient at times and this is just another one of those periods where I've got to fight my way back.  

"I'm just so excited about the opportunity to do so but I'm 27 now, I just want to play the game, enjoy myself and give myself the best opportunity to do well and that's what I've done so far." 

So it's with a sense of maturity that Marsh can sit back and analyse the summer just gone and find a silver lining.

The turbulence has put him in good stead for the Australia A tour he's currently on, where he's scored 40 not out and 29 not out in two emphatic victories before Tuesday's washout in Worcester.

While he says he's not focused on an Ashes berth, the right-hander got a taste of the national set-up earlier this month when he was drafted into the World Cup squad as injury cover for fellow allrounder Marcus Stoinis. 

Marsh assigned himself the task of "injecting some energy" into the group that has been on the road for two months, and the team looked upbeat in recent wins over Bangladesh and England.

But for now, the focus is on the present for Marsh, and that means scoring runs and taking wickets for Australia A, whose next game is against Gloucestershire in Bristol on Sunday.

"It was certainly a challenging year but like all people say, when you go through challenges and setbacks, you've got to take it in your stride," he said. 

"I learnt so much about myself and my leadership over that period of time, I'm kind of grateful for it now.

"I would have liked to have my time again but I'm really grateful for those experiences and hopefully they'll make me a better captain and a better cricketer in the future."

Australia A tour of the UK

Get live scores and all the latest news from Australia A's tour of the UK on cricket.com.au and the CA Live app

Australia A one-day squad: Travis Head (c), Matthew Wade, Will Pucovski, Peter Handscomb, Mitch Marsh (vc), D'Arcy Short, Kurtis Patterson, Ashton Agar, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Josh Hazlewood (vc), Sean Abbott, Andrew Tye

Australia A four-day squad: Tim Paine (c), Marcus Harris, Kurtis Patterson, Will Pucovski, Travis Head (vc), Peter Handscomb, Matthew Wade, Mitch Marsh, Michael Neser, Jon Holland, James Pattinson, Jackson Bird, Josh Hazlewood (vc), Chris Tremain

One-day fixtures:

June 20: Australia A beat Northamptonshire by six wickets

June 23: Australia A beat Derbyshire by seven wickets

June 25: Australia A v Worcestershire, match abandoned

June 30: Australia A v Gloucestershire, Bristol

July 2: Australia A v Gloucestershire, Bristol

Four-day fixtures:

July 7-10: Australia A v Sussex, Arundel

July 13-16: Australia A v England Lions, Canterbury

July 23-26: Australia v Australia A, Hampshire