Dunk won’t rule out first-class comeback

LIFE as a Twenty20 gun for hire sits comfortably with Ben Dunk — but he hasn’t completely put a line through a possible first-class revival.

Dunk, who moved to Tasmania seven years ago from Queensland, lost his Tigers contract at the end of last summer following a lean patch with the willow.

Now firmly settled in the state, the dynamic left-hander is at peace with the decision and has his sights firmly on ensuring he can have an impact in numerous T20 tournaments around the world.

However if he can continue churning out scores for South Hobart-Sandy Bay — he cracked 167 in the Sharks CTPL season opening narrow victory against Kingborough last Saturday — his domestic days may not be over.

“To be honest, we [he and his partner] are pretty settled, it is a nice place to raise a family. Never say never, I have obviously moved around a lot throughout my career,” Dunk said.

“But I am pretty comfortable with where it is at at the moment in terms of cricket.

“I would never say never to playing for Tasmania, they gave me an unbelievable opportunity seven years ago to play first-class cricket.

“I certainly haven’t retired and I’ve loved every moment playing for Tasmania, but at the same time they have a great bunch of young kids coming through and it is pretty exciting to watch where they are heading.

“The other great thing I am able to do is actually play the game. The last few years with Tasmania my performances didn’t warrant me actually playing as much as I would have liked so you ended up being a professional trainer rather than playing that many games.

“With Twenty20 cricket, training is the second priority to actually playing and you actually get to play a lot of cricket in a short space of time.”

Dunk recently played in the Canadian T20 competition, and will feature in the second season of the T10 League in Dubai starting late next month before preparing for his second BBL campaign with the Melbourne Stars.

The T10 will see a host of cricket’s biggest names take part — including the likes of Eoin Morgan, Shahid Afridi, Hurricanes star Jofra Archer, Shane Watson and Brendon McCullum — leaving Dunk confident he will enter BBL|08 in pristine touch.

“I have led the runs twice in the Big Bash in seven seasons, which is a pretty good strike rate. I am confident my form will bounce back as it has in the past.

“My lead-up now looks really good. The T10 tournament has attracted some of the best players around the world, that will be as good preparation as anyone is going to have I think.”