🔗 Share this article

The historic Ashes series may offer a reason to cheer, but this contest will also see the Australian team host more birthday parties than Timezone in the nineties. New boy Jake Weatherald had his thirty-first birthday a day prior to the team was announced. Nathan Lyon celebrates 38 the day before the Test in Perth. Beau Webster turns 32 just before the Brisbane match, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on day two in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood turns 35 on the final day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 before January is over.

Ageing Squad Fascination Builds

For two or three years there has been mounting fascination with the average age of this side and especially the bowling attack. It is unusual to have almost every player near a Test side being over 30, aside from young mascot Cameron Green and occasional visitor Sam Konstas. But it wasn't necessarily true that older age was a disadvantage: a Test squad boasting a four-man attack with 1,568 wickets between them is scarcely a disadvantage, and it stands to reason that all of those bowlers are well into their careers.

I've never felt this sure at the start of an Ashes tour | a former player

Perhaps what most amplified the discussion is that the backup bowlers over that period, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also well into their 30s. Younger bowlers have briefly joined teams – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before vanishing for years with injury, meaning there has been no clear line of succession.

Change Imposed by Injuries

So far, that hasn’t mattered, as the Big Four plus Boland have continued backing up. Any team knows that having a batch of similarly-aged players might mean a batch of similarly-timed departures, but so far change has remained hypothetical: a train that would indeed be coming round the bend when she comes, but one that hadn’t yet steamed into view.

Now, abruptly, change is upon them, imposed on this Australian squad in the space of a few weeks. The back injury to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would probably only miss the first Test, was the team management assessment, and as the first-change bowler behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could comfortably be replaced by Boland.

But now that Hazlewood has been sidelined with a hamstring strain, the balance undergoes a far greater shift with two players missing rather than one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two accurate right-arm bowlers give the stability and precision that enables Starc’s left-arm speed and movement to be used more as a weapon of attack. Losing both of them means a fundamental shift in the balance of the team. Boland handling the new ball is nothing new in his first-class career, but he has been so effective in Tests entering the attack after seven to eight overs of early pressure. Now he’ll probably have to be the opening bowler.

Newcomer Confronts Expectations

Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at 31 years old himself won’t be an intimidated youngster, but he might become an overawed 31-year-old. A full stadium crowd, half of it English, for the first Test of a eagerly awaited Ashes series will not make for an easy debut, no matter how many media stories describe him as relaxed. He could be wheeled onto the field on a sun lounger and still be nervous.

Sign up to our cricket newsletter

It's uncertain, it might all go swimmingly for this revamped bowling lineup. It might not work out. What is notable is how quickly Australia have transitioned from the certainty of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the uncertainty of Starc, Lyon, mumble mumble. Who knows what new injuries the first Test may bring. It's unknown whether Cummins will be good to go for Brisbane, and able to continue after that match, given how tricky stress fractures can be. Who knows how long Hazlewood might be out, with a track record of going down early in series and a history of minor injuries becoming extended absences.

Outlook Unclear

The back half of the contest may see the main four bowlers reunited and all performing well. Or it might experience transition setting in much earlier than the stretch goal of 2027 in England. Not through Neser, who is apparently next in line and could be a excellent pink-ball Brisbane choice, but beyond that with choices unclear. Sean Abbott was in the initial squad, though he’s now also injured and has not yet played a Test. Richardson has just had his crash-test-dummy arm put back on, and this level is not the place for gradually starting one’s work. After them lies the true uncertainty, and throughout it a chance for the visiting team. You can sense that change approaching, coming around the corner, and the English team hasn't seen the sunshine since they can't recall when.