Australia had two primary objectives leading into the recent white-ball tours of the West Indies and Bangladesh – generate some much-needed momentum ahead of the T20 World Cup and fill the gaps in its 15-player squad.
But after registering a fifth consecutive T20 series defeat, the Australian side has never looked more vulnerable.
Australia was bowled out for 62 on a deteriorating pitch at Dhaka’s Shere Bangla National Stadium overnight, with only two batters scoring more than four runs against Bangladesh.
Matthew Wade’s side was rolled in just 13.4 overs, making it Australia’s shortest innings in 144 years of international cricket.
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The record-breaking collapse ends a miserable white-ball tour for Justin Langer’s men, in which Australia lost eight of their 10 T20 matches against the West Indies and Bangladesh.
Bangladesh had never defeated Australia in the game’s short format before last Tuesday, but has since achieved the feat four times in six days.
Reuters journalist Kanishka Raj Singh tweeted: “As a lifelong fan of Australia, I can‘t recollect a more embarrassing team. These players don’t deserve to wear Australia’s jersey.”
Their next challenge is the coveted T20 World Cup, the only ICC trophy Australia has never lifted apart from the newly-introduced World Test Championship.
Needless to say, Australia’s chances of claiming the title look reasonably slim, particularly when glancing at who they’ll come up against in the group stage.
The Aussies will face reigning T20 World Cup champions the West Indies, 50-over world champions England and a talented South African outfit, who currently sit above Australia on the ICC rankings.
To make matters worse, the T20 tournament will be played in similar conditions to Dhaka, with matches scheduled in sub-continent nations the United Arab Emirates and Oman.
The one silver lining Australian cricket fans can celebrate is the timely resurgence of West Australian all-rounder Mitchell Marsh.
The younger Marsh brother was Australia’s highest run-scorer against the West Indies and Bangladesh, accumulating 375 runs at a commendable average of 37.50 and strike rate of 115.61.
But apart from Marsh, Australia’s batting over the past few weeks would at best be described as woefully average.
Against Bangladesh, Matthew Wade averaged 8.40, Moises Henriques averaged 8.00, Alex Carey 8.75, Ashton Turner 7.00 and Josh Philippe 9.50.
Marsh and Ben McDermott were the only Aussies to register more than 50 runs in the five-match series, with neither mustering a strike rate greater than 100.
Former Test batter Mark Waugh tweeted: “Despite difficult run scoring conditions in the Caribbean and Bangladesh our batting has not been up to International standard. Poor game awareness and too much premeditation has engulfed our batsmen apart from Mitch Marsh.”
Australian selectors would take comfort knowing several of the country’s most reliable T20 talent are back home, with the likes of David Warner, Glenn Maxwell and Marcus Stoinis opting out of the white-ball tour following a nightmare Indian Premier League campaign.
But considering Australia boasts the world’s second-best domestic T20 league, the apparent lack of batting depth is undeniably cause for concern.
It is worth noting the Dhaka pitch was more laborious than anything Australia’s batters had witnessed in their professional careers.
Veteran all-rounder Dan Christian has played 357 T20 matches over the past 15 years, but ranks this week’s Dhaka deck as the most challenging pitch he’s ever batted on.
“They don’t compare to anything I’ve faced in my career,” Christian said on Monday.
“These are as difficult conditions as I’ve seen for T20 cricket – 120 is like 190, it’s an extremely difficult place to try and bat. We’ve seen all the spinners and even the seamers, as soon as they start bowling slower balls it’s really, really hard work. It’s holding in the surface, gripping and turning and it’s a big ground as well. It’s certainly been different cricket but in terms of getting into rhythm or any kind of flow, it’s been pretty hard.”
Regardless, Australia’s ongoing struggles with facing spin in the sub-continent remains a worrying trend ahead of three Test tours to Asian nations in 2022.
“There’s not a lot of positives to take out of it, to get beaten in the fashion we did, especially tonight, was not good enough from an Australian cricket team regardless of the personnel we’ve got here,” Australian captain Wade said.
“The reality is we need to get better at spin, myself included. There’s a lot of players in this team who need to find a way to score runs in these conditions.
“(Bangladesh) are a terrific team in their own conditions, their spinners bowled really well, and they still found a way to find the extra runs and that‘s something we can definitely get better at doing. Whether they came a little harder at the front and that is something we maybe needed to do earlier.”
A mandatory two-week quarantine awaits Australia’s cricket stars when they return home.
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