No matter who does what over the rest of the summer, it is hard to imagine there will be many performances that warm the collective soul more emphatically than Nathan McSweeney’s heroics in the BBL on Sunday night.
Just days earlier, McSweeney had been ruthlessly discarded by Australia’s selectors after three Tests that rate among the harshest initiations into international cricket any player has endured in recent memory.
Chosen as opener, despite no real experience at the top of the order, McSweeney was not surprisingly a lamb to the slaughter against one of the greatest pacemen of all time in India’s Jaspirit Bumrah.
After 72 runs in six innings, with a top score of 39, McSweeney was cast aside last week as selectors rushed in teenage opener Sam Konstas – the same player they weren’t brave enough to pick before the series started, presumably because they felt he was too young and inexperienced.
McSweeney subsequently admitted he was “devastated” by his omission, but the 25-year-old has nonetheless copped it on the chin, said all the right things, and vowed to learn from the experience, work hard and win a recall.
He took the first step towards that on Sunday night with a match-winning 78 not out from 49 balls for the Brisbane Heat against Adelaide Strikers, an innings that reaffirmed the theory that McSweeney is made of the right stuff.
Different format, different level, but it was an important game for McSweeney. The last thing he needed was another failure, which may well have left him devoid of all confidence.
Instead he was immediately back in the groove, banking runs just as calmly and methodically as he had been before being handed his Baggy Green cap.
In years to come, the right-hander might well thank the selectors for unintentionally doing him a favour.
Plenty of others before him – Steve Waugh, Ricky Ponting, Michael Clarke, Matthew Hayden and Justin Langer, for starters – were all dropped from the national team and returned as better players.
McSweeney could well be back in future, a hungrier, tougher version than we saw in his first three Tests, now that he knows what is required to survive at that level.
Nathan McSweeney celebrates the Brisbane Heat’s BBL victory over the Adelaide Strikers. (Photo by Chris Hyde – CA/Cricket Australia via Getty Images)
But still, if that’s how it plays out, in my opinion the selectors deserve no credit whatsoever.
I’m struggling to recall a worse case of mismanagement from the men who choose the Aussie team.
Brad Hodge (Test average 55.88) and Kurtis Patterson (last Test innings 114 not out) might argue the case, and so too the late Phil Hughes, who was dropped four times before the age of 25.
But as former Test opener Ed Cowan noted before McSweeney’s debut, to pick a player when there is no data to reinforce the belief that he can do a specific job is nothing but a “guess”.
And in backflipping and axing McSweeney, the selectors are now second-guessing their original guess.
Since George Bailey replaced Trevor Hohns as head selector in 2021, there has been plenty of commentary debating whether he is “too close” to the current players, some of whom are his former teammates.
I don’t think it makes any real difference whether Bailey plays golf and dines out with the players, or whether he’s never ever met them in the flesh – just as long as he picks the right ones.
When Bailey and his fellow panellists took a stab on little-known Scott Boland against the Poms in 2021, it was a masterstroke, as evidenced by his unforgettable haul of 6-7 in the second innings.
Likewise, Queensland spinner Matt Kuhnemann was a bolter when he was rushed to India last year but performed credibly in all three appearances, taking 5-16 to help Australia win the third Test of the series. (In saying that, Kuhnemann was only fast-tracked into the Test squad because the selectors had apparently lost faith in incumbent first-choice selection Ashton Agar.)
The other notable selection call of the Bailey era was allowing Steve Smith to volunteer his services as opener after David Warner’s retirement last summer.
Smith played four Tests at the top, averaging 28.5 and scoring an unbeaten 91 against the West Indies in Brisbane last season that rated, for mine, as one of his best-ever innings.
Matthew Kuhnemann celebrates taking the wicket of Umesh Yadav. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)
It was a short-lived experiment, and Smith is now back in his trademark No.4 position. Nonetheless, it was hardly a glowing endorsement of those who rubber-stamped his role change.
Indeed, I would suggest it is more evidence of second-guessing.
It’s a real worry for Australian cricket, for two reasons.
First and foremost, a host of Australia’s current Test squad are rapidly approaching their use-by date.
There will be massive chopping and changing over the next year or two and, if selectors are relying on guesswork, there is unlikely to be a smooth transition into the new era.
History tells us that when the Australian team loses a bunch of champion players in close proximity, lean years tend to follow.
At this particular juncture, too, the process of replacement and regeneration has been complicated by the dearth of candidates banging on the door in domestic ranks.
Moreover, the Ashes are looming large on the horizon and the Poms seem to be having no such issues.
Coach Brendon McCullum is happy to pick T20 tyros to bat No.3 in his Test side. He had no qualms about phasing out Jimmy Anderson to usher in new strike weapons in Brydon Carse and Gus Atkinson.
“Bazball” seems to incorporate not only a wildcard, entertaining style of play but also a positive mindset at the selection table. The Poms just pick ’em and back ’em.
Time will tell if McSweeney gets to take on the Poms next summer. If he does, he should theoretically be much better prepared, given the experience he has gained this summer.
Here’s hoping he makes a go of it second time around. If he does, I’d argue that will be despite the selectors, not because of them.
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