OH BROTHER! Australian selectors set to drop the wrong Marsh
MITCHELL Marsh is the man in Australian cricket.
Amid the storm of conjecture over who will cop the Boxing Day axe, the man in the top six with a batting average of 23.75 is the one who continues to evade intense scrutiny.
It’s understood Joe Burns may now have the inside running to edge out rival Shaun Marsh and hold onto his opening berth, having been under
luckiest siege for the past two weeks. There is a feeling that selectors are, at this stage, leaning towards making a strong policy decision and remaining loyal to the unwritten code of “last man in, first man out”.
That would mean Shaun Marsh is the man who must, as harsh as it is, make way for Usman Khawaja’s return from injury at No. 3. However, former Test captain Allan Border declared emphatically on Fox Sports’ Inside Cricket last night that it should be younger brother Mitchell Marsh who is squeezed out.
Marsh is a project player for the future, said Border, but his current numbers with the bat simply don’t stack up.
The reality is, though, that Marsh is living with impunity on account of his status as an all-rounder.
While Burns, Khawaja and Shaun Marsh prepared for two weeks of sleepless nights, coach Darren Lehmann had already announced just minutes after the Hobart Test that Mitchell Marsh was guaranteed selection for Boxing Day – based purely on the notion that he can bowl.
But when you consider that Burns is averaging 40 in Tests and Shaun Marsh has posted back-to-back match-winning knocks for his country, including a last-start 181, it’s extraordinary to think Mitchell Marsh – whose primary responsibility is as a batsman – has not been under the hammer.