Category: Australia Cricket

It may be a strange time of year for an Australian, and a strange tournament structure, but the decider is vindicated further each time it is played

In Australia it is winter, and it is footy season. AFL, NRL, the works. The autumn was passing strange, with unnervingly high temperatures and the Gold Coast Suns in the top four. But now it is June, and feeling more as it should, with nights in the southern half of the continent dipping deep into single degrees. The Raiders must be breathing out steam on Canberra mornings, half remembering dreams of ending a premiership wait. And strangely positioned among all this, the Australia Test team is getting ready to play cricket.

Australian winter tours happen, but outside the occasional Asian or Caribbean jaunt this century, they’re confined to quadrennial visits to England. Two years ago, the first time Australia qualified for a World Test Championship final, that match came directly before an Ashes series. As well as turning the supposed culmination into an incongruous appetizer, it also made the WTC final melt into the Ashes summer.

Continue reading...

Australian captain Pat Cummins has backed Marnus Labuschagne to repay the faith of selectors in the World Test Championship final against South Africa beginning at Lord’s on Wednesday.

Usman Khawaja once joked that Marnus Labuschagne had “opening-itis” but suggested that his Queensland teammate may have to suck it up and get over it ahead of the World Test Championship final against South Africa at Lords starting Wednesday.

India’s Mahendra Singh Dhoni and South Africa’s Hashim Amla and Graeme Smith were among seven new inductees into the International Cricket Council Hall of Fame announced Monday.

As an English arch-enemy offered tips to South Africa on how to dethrone Australia in the World Test Championship decider, Steve Smith declared he had no concerns about whether the Aussies will cop the wrath of MCC members at Lord’s.

Pat Cummins has taken a sly dig at the Poms on a bizarre day where the Aussie team was booted from Lord’s just days before the World Test Championship final.

The Proteas choking when it matters most is a tale as old as the country itself as history again weighs heavy on their World Test Championship hopes

A South African cricket fan’s standout World Cup catastrophe will depend on when they were born. Baby boomers cite the time, back in 1992, when Brian McMillan was left needing 22 runs off one ball after rain in Sydney washed away any hope of a chase. Millennials are forever haunted by Alan Donald’s dropped bat in that tied semi-final in 1999. Gen Zs must still be wondering how Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller failed to get over the line with 30 needed off as many balls in last year’s T20 final.

The Proteas choking when it matters most is a tale as old as the country itself. Longer, in fact, if you consider that Nelson Mandela was elected president two years after this story began. And throughout it all, one antagonist has loomed largest.

Continue reading...

• 34-year-old giving selectors headaches after strong form in IPL

• Australia fast bowler missed last World Test Championship decider

Buoyed by an outstanding IPL, Australia quick Josh Hazlewood feels he is bowling better than at any point in his decorated career.

Struck down by niggling injuries in recent years, Hazlewood could be forgiven for starting to taper having already taken 279 wickets from 72 Tests.

Continue reading...

Australian quick Josh Hazlewood has tried to dismiss any concerns that he will not be ready for the World Test Championship final against South Africa at Lords, starting Wednesday.

Jos Buttler produced a captain’s innings in his first T20 appearance since giving up the post as he and the recalled Liam Dawson guided England to a 21-run victory over the West Indies in a series opener at Chester-le-Street.

Packed crowds in India celebrating their cricket team’s victory ended in a deadly stampede on Wednesday with 11 mainly young fans crushed to death, the local state’s chief minister said.

Wealth of Big Three is skewing Test cricket and a big win for Australia at Lord’s would only emphasise this gulf

On a recent episode of The Grade Cricketer podcast, the hosts, Sam Perry and Ian Higgins, tore lumps out of South Africa in a foul-mouthed tirade about the World Test Championship final against Australia. Perry predicted a finish “inside three days” and Higgins, practically thumping the table, said: “If I don’t look at a scorecard and South Africa are three for spit my TV is going through the window.” Cue big alpha chuckles and main-character knee slaps.

I know they were joking, skewering Australian arrogance as much as South African frailty, and that they have built a formidable brand that runs on side-mouthed jibes and hyperbolic bluster. Still, the lizard part of my brain lit up in protest. How dare they dismiss my countrymen? I wasn’t alone in taking offence.

Continue reading...

Hobart Hurricanes hero Mitch Owen headlines Australia’s T20 squad to play the West Indies later next month, off the back of his whirlwind century in last season’s Big Bash final.

Virat Kohli said on Tuesday he had given his “youth and prime” to land one of the best moments of his career as Royal Challengers Bengaluru secured him a first-ever Indian Premier League T20 title at the 18th time of asking.

Batting great Virat Kohli fulfilled an 18-year dream of winning an IPL title with Royal Challengers Bengaluru after they beat Punjab Kings by six runs in Tuesday’s final in Ahmedabad, with Australian quick Josh Hazlewood’s role again decisive.