Former captain Ricky Ponting believes that Australia A skipper Nathan McSweeney is better bet to make Test debut against India compared to teenager Sam Konstas, who wasn’t able to bat well against India ‘A’ in both innings in the ongoing unofficial Test.
On the other hand, McSweeney batted comparatively well in both the innings, playing steady knocks of 39 and 47 in the first and second innings respectively.
In the ongoing unofficial Test between India A and Australia A, there were 3 candidates Konstas, McSweeney and veteran Marcus Harris giving audition for opener’s slot in upcoming Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
“I thought a bit more about it, and he (Konstas) is so young and he has probably not even played on grounds like Optus Stadium or at the Gabba,” Ponting told ICC.
“He wouldn’t have played a pink-ball (match) at Adelaide Oval either. So there’s a lot of things that stack up against the young guy, although there’s no doubt that he’s got talent,” Ponting added.
Ponting doesn’t think George Bailey and his panel would go back to Cameron Bancroft and Harris and hence McSweeney is the obvious choice.
“Another thing that I’d said then was that I don’t think they’d go back to a (Cameron) Bancroft or (Marcus) Harris – because if they’re willing to do that, they would’ve done it the last year,” Ponting said.
“So the only name left for me more or less is Nathan McSweeney… he got the most out of any of those guys from the A game in Australia at the moment. And he’s more experienced. He (McSweeney) has captained Australia A in the past, and he’s captaining them now. So I’m leaning towards McSweeney now for that opening role at the start of the Australian summer,” Ponting concluded.
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