Australian head coach Justin Langer talked about trying out the new combinations ahead of the ICC T20 World Cup. He said experiments will begin with the West Indies series.
As part of the plan, all-rounder Mitch Marsh will bat at three.
“We see him as a bit of an enforcer up there, he faces fast bowling as well as anyone around the place. He hits the ball with brutal power and we’re looking forward to giving him a chance at the top of the order,” said Langer on Thursday.
Langer also hinted on Moises Henriques and wicket-keeper Ben McDermott, Josh Phillipe getting the chance in the series while Mathew Wade could open the batting along with captain Aaron Finch.
“The six batsmen and five specialist bowlers — it’s certainly a model I’ve gone with throughout my whole head coaching career, there’s no surprise to anyone with that. And it’s been a very successful model. But if you look ahead … We might look at this 7-4 model, where you have a couple of all-rounders. Different teams do it differently around the world,” said Langer.
“Looking ahead also to the World Cup, if we look at where it’s being played — the UAE — there’s going to be enormous amount of traffic on those wickets, with the IPL, the PSL that has already been… we’re going to play on some pretty worn wickets, especially towards the back end of the World Cup. We might have to find different ways of winning our games.”
Australia will play West Indies in a T20I for the first time since 2014 at the Darren Sammy Stadium.
