BIG FOUR TEST

Aussie stars face long- form challenges against India

THE “big four” of Australian Test cricket are likely to go into next month’s blockbuster series against India without having sighted a pink or red ball for almost 12 months.

Pat Cummins, Steve Smith, David Warner and Josh Hazlewood will return from the IPL chock- full of Twenty20 cricket but with no long- form match play since the Sydney Test in early January.

In the compacted schedule there will be just one opportunity for the superstar quartet to have a last- minute tune- up, on December 11 when Australia A plays a three- day pink- ball tour match against

India under lights at the SCG.

However, it’s understood selectors will lean towards not playing Cummins, Smith, Warner and Hazlewood for Australia A because giving them a mental and physical freshen- up after months overseas in a bubble will be of greater importance.

Virat Kohli and India’s IPL stars are every chance to play in that match in what could be an unusually high- profile tour game even without Smith and Warner, with Fox Cricket to send out their own commentary team to broadcast it live.

“We’ll wait for Cricket Australia to announce the schedule, but if quality cricket like that is available, Fox Cricket will certainly be looking to show it,” Fox Cricket chief Matt Weiss said.

“We’ll be hoping some of the biggest superstars in the game will warm- up for the day- night Test.”

The Indians, who named their squads yesterday, will have the same concerns about freshening up their stars after the IPL, but are more likely to field a Test- like team at the SCG given they requested a pink- ball warm- up game to prepare for their first- ever daynight Test on Australian soil.

India has already lost Ishant Sharma and Rohit Sharma to IPL injuries and ensuring players don’t burn out is seen as a priority leading into the first pink- ball Test from December 17 in Adelaide, particularly when Smith, Warner, Cummins and Hazlewood have been isolated in an overseas bubble since late August.

The four — plus India’s IPL stars — will only just emerge from their two weeks’ quarantine in Sydney from November 11 before launching into a white- ball international series.

Australia will play two onedayers and two T20s in Sydney and one of each in Canberra.

In another quirk of the schedule, there will be two tour matches played between thw teams before the Test series.