cricket with balls

Had Michael Clarke not been selected captain of Australia’s T20 squad, I would have given Hilditch a sloppy hug.

Australia’s squad was just about as good as it could be, and for Hilditch, it was quite daring.  Going in with three strike bowlers who can all be quite wayward and a 20 year old untried leggie was a pretty bold move for someone once went trawling through the Sydney grade cricket bargain bins for a defensive spin option.

Hilditch must have realised that his previous T20 squads were pretty rubbish, so with this one he tried to get the best line up he could. Other than Harris coming in for Bollinger when Lee was injured there was no real problems in the squad that I had, other than one.

The captain.

Picking Michael Clarke as captain was a political appointment rather than a selection on merit.  Obviously on merit the better T20 cricketer whose team wins T20 tournaments for fun, Cam White, would have been the captain.

Instead Clarke was appointed as captain because one day he will be test captain, and while I understand the logic (even if the thought of all this sickens me), what is the point of making someone captain of a form of cricket they suck at? How can Clarke, newly separated from a glamour python, be expected to take over his first Australian team in the one form of cricket he has never been any good at?

Had he taken over the one day side, given Ponting even more time to prepare for the short balls he will face in test matches, it would make sense.  Clarke is class in One Day cricket. He would have taken over a side that he has been a successful part of for hyears and wouldn’t have had to worry about improving his form just to get picked.

In T20 cricket Clarke is an albatross made of excrement.  His batting is pathetically bad, his strike rate is worse than that and his only redeeming feature is that his arms don’t look bad in those stupid green arm stockings they are forced to wear.

Now that Clarke has proved his bad form to the world with the bat (and his captaincy wasn’t exactly Mike Brearly like either) in the T20, the easy, and probably correct decision would be to give White the role.  It seems the main reason not to give White the role at this stage is that he might be good at it. That will make Clarke’s promotion harder to justify.

It is clear that Hilditch is still not prepared to take pick the best T20 side and this is why he has given the role to someone who all but claimed he shouldn’t be picked.

Clarke’s continued selection means that T20 cricket is not being taken seriously by Australia, and is actually being seen as a development format.  Which is fine, if they take it seriously as a development format.

I don’t really care that much about T20, if Australia got bundled out of every tournament early, and won every test series I’d be more than happy.  But don’t do it fucken half assed.  Don’t pick a good T20 squad a lumber it without a project captain.

Drop anyone over 28 other than Clarke.  Bring in Starc, Wade, Marsh, Keath, Pattinson, Hazelwood and Cutting.  Make sure all these guys are used to International cricket so that one day they may flourish in the test arena.

Either develop or take it seriously, Hilditch, don’t do both badly.