With Australia staring down the barrel of a series defeat in South Africa, it seems like a massive review is coming.
The selectors and Pat Cummins will have to face their critics. It wasn’t long ago that Cummins said “we don’t believe in batting orders”. Well, their top seven has been found wanting again. The dire chase came after Cummins won the toss and elected to bowl first. It was always going to spin hard on day five – and it is. Australia are buckling under the pressure.
Kerry O’Keeffe: “The top seven doesn’t bounce up at you. There’s something clinically wrong with that top seven. People are batting out of order. Marnus’ career is over, question marks around Connolly remain, the running between wickets under pressure; it was so disjointed.”
Mark Waugh on Fox Cricket says, “It’s been papered over by the bowlers for the last 12-15 months. They’ve got out of jail a lot, and through individual batting whether it’s Travis Head, Steve Smith or Alex Carey, but as a batting unit, we haven’t batted well for, I’d say, two years.”
