Khawaja happy to get stuck straight back in

In a perfect world, Usman Khawaja would have settled into a comfortable chair in Worcestershire's plush Graeme Hick Pavilion on Wednesday morning, and watched Australia's openers bat for a few hours before he was required in the middle.

But cricket is a game that doesn't abide perfection – even its statistically most flawless player (Don Bradman) finished with final marks marginally below 100 – so barely 44 hours after being part of a pulsating first Test win, Khawaja was back in the middle.

Where he was once again batting for his country, in challenging conditions, against a nearly new ball.

Such is the heavily compacted schedule of this unprecedented British summer, in which a five-Test Ashes campaign has been appended to a two-month World Cup tournament, Australia's men's team enjoyed a solitary day's break between playing commitments.

That day was spent travelling an hour or less down the M5 motorway from Warwickshire to neighbouring Worcestershire, where a three-day tour game began on Wednesday under heavy skies that cleared only sporadically throughout the afternoon.

With the touring team sent into bat by Worcestershire's seam-bowling skipper Joe Leach who was keen to exploit the conditions, Khawaja was called into action an hour after play began upon the dismissal of auxiliary opener Marcus Harris.

And while the Test No.3 might have preferred to watch quietly from the dressing room, as the sun slowly broke through and the hard, proud seam on the Dukes-brand ball was flattened along with the initial life in the pitch, he saw the benefits in being summoned early.

Particularly given that's what he will expect throughout the remainder of the Ashes series, where the potency of both teams' new-ball attacks makes top-order batting a high-risk business.

As Khawaja noted at day's end, there was soreness in his body following a tough five-day Test and it was an atypical celebration of an important win to be back on the park so soon, but that was embraced as another character-building challenge.

"Test cricket is tough, and everything doesn't go your way all the time, so in that space it's a nice way to prepare," he said on Wednesday evening of the tight turnaround between matches.

"You can get back (into playing) and be lazy and let it go, or you can get out there and actually get something out of it.

"That was actually quite a tough wicket, and it still is a tough wicket as you can see with our bowlers bowling on it (to have Worcestershire 3-31 at stumps).

"There's a lot of nibble out there, and it's going both ways off the deck.

"It was pretty soft this morning, and pretty hard to drive.

"But any time in the middle is good time.

"England, as we know, can chuck up a variety of different conditions – when the sun's out it can be very good, and when the ball's swinging it can be quite tough.

"That was nipping today, and also quite tough.

"Every day you get out there, you're trying to get better so that's all we were trying to do today."

On the evidence presented by the current Ashes tour thus far, Khawaja is improving with each outing.

Having been robbed (due to a hamstring injury) of game time at the intra-squad match at Southampton that preceded the first Test, he has batted for increasingly lengthy stints and with greater return in every innings since.

His 13 on the first morning at Edgbaston, when batting was at its most daunting, was followed by a typically stylish 40 in the second and then a patient 57 from 110 balls against Worcestershire's disciplined seamers in the shadow of a momentous Test win.

The fact that each of those knocks ended with a catch to the keeper won't be lost on the left-hander, who was Australia's second-highest Test runs scorer (behind century maker at Worcester, Travis Head) in the year that preceded this Ashes campaign.

Those similar modes of dismissal also highlight the difficulties faced by first-drop batters when they arrive at the crease after the loss of an early wicket, and the near-new ball is swinging in the damp air or 'nibbling' off the seam and the surface.

But Khawaja isn't about to change his batsman-in-waiting approach, and engage in obsessive study of the opposition bowling and pitch behaviour in the search for premeditated answers before he begins an innings.

Even if he would prefer an extra hour or two relaxing in a chair, while the ball softens and the bowlers tire, before he's called into action.

"You've just got to get out there and assess it as quickly as possible," Khawaja said of batting at first drop in England.

"It's not like I'm trying to watch balls, or I'm not trying to watch balls (intently from the dressing room), everyone's different.

"Some have got a screen in front of them, some are just chilled (sitting) back and watching, and others are not watching.

"We've all played cricket in England a lot – I have, and all the other guys have too.

"The mindset is still pretty much the same.

"What we got out here today was very different to what we got last game in Birmingham, the wicket was totally different."

And if history is a guide, it will be vastly changed again when the second Test gets underway at Lord's in London on August 14.

Starc and Hazlewood will a chance to further push their claims for a Test recall when day two of the tour match in Worcester beings at 11am local time (8pm AEST) Thursday.

2019 Qantas Ashes Tour of England

Australia squad: Tim Paine (c), Cameron Bancroft, Pat Cummins, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Marsh, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Peter Siddle, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Matthew Wade, David Warner.

England squad: Joe Root (c), Moeen Ali, Jimmy Anderson, Jofra Archer, Jonny Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Rory Burns, Jos Buttler, Sam Curran, Joe Denly, Jason Roy, Ben Stokes (vc), Olly Stone, Chris Woakes.

First Test: Australia beat England by 251 runs at Edgbaston

Tour match: Australians v Worcestershire, August 7-9

Second Test: August 14-18,Lord's

Third Test: August 22-26, Headingley

Tour match: Australians v Derbyshire, August 29-31

Fourth Test: September 4-8, Old Trafford

Fifth Test: September 12-16, The Oval