Aaron Finch, Australia’s limited-overs captain, believes Glenn Maxwell will be back in the reckoning for ODIs soon enough after the all-rounder was left out of the squad named for the three-match series against India in January. Maxwell, who was part of the seven changes from the World Cup squad, had failed to score a half-century in ten innings.
“He’ll be disappointed, like everyone who missed out is but at the end of the day he just hasn’t got the runs required of a top-order player in one-day cricket recently,” Finch said on Wednesday (December 18). “No doubt he’ll be back. He’s a gun. A three-dimensional player that can have such a huge impact. It’s just a matter of time, he’ll get some runs and be right back up there in the frame again.”
Maxwell, who had taken a break from cricket citing mental health reasons, will return to playing for the Melbourne Stars on Friday, against Brisbane Heat.
Meanwhile, the selectors also opted to go for Ashton Agar over Nathan Lyon, with Finch even backing Agar to be more useful in Indian conditions.
“(Lyon) can still play a future part. We saw the way he bowled in the World Cup when he got his opportunity,” Finch said. “Just probably a change in our approach to the spinning allrounder in Agar as opposed to the medium-pace allrounder, that’s probably where someone had to drop out and unfortunately that was Nath. At the end of the day it still comes down to picking the best side to win. Probably a slightly different structure to how we did it last time but still very happy with how it looks.”
Shaun Marsh, Nathan Coulter-Nile and Nathan Lyon, who were part of the World Cup squad were left out, while Jason Behrendorff has been ruled out with injury. In-form Marnus Labuschagne is likely to make his ODI debut, while Sean Abbott, Josh Hazlewood and Ashton Turner were named in the squad. Finch, however, added that it’s not the end of the road for anyone left out.
“If you look at the squad we had in India and the UAE before the World cup it (the January touring party) is not too dissimilar to that,” Finch said. “The addition of Ashton Agar as an allrounder as opposed to a medium pace allrounder (is the change). It’s going in the direction we want to go over the next 3.5 years to the next (50-over) World Cup. And while you don’t look that far ahead right now, still have one eye on the planning towards it and build towards there.”
