Aussie coach reflects on 'failed' Cup campaign

Australia men's team coach Andrew McDonald has labelled his team's World Cup defence a "failed campaign" but noted he and his fellow selectors have time to reflect on potential personnel changes given their next T20 international assignment is nine months away.

The reigning champions hopes of sneaking through to the finals of this tournament vapourised on Saturday night when England claimed a last-over win against Sri Lanka, ensuring the host nation finished third in their group.

As the players flew out of Adelaide this morning, McDonald claimed the squad had been left "feeling a little numb" about the events of the preceding 24 hours and added the team was bitterly disappointed about their inability to reach the playoff games.

And he said that in addition to the heavy first-up loss to New Zealand that inflicted mortal damage to their net run rate, it was late innings hitting by Ireland's Lorcan Tucker and Afghanistan's Rashid Khan in the final Super 12s matches that further hampered Australia's hopes.

While scrutiny has fallen on several selection decisions, most notably the call to drop pace bowler Mitchell Starc in favour of fellow seamer Kane Richardson for Friday's match against Afghanistan, McDonald reiterated it was a tactical decision based on Richardson's death-bowling credentials.

"We were looking to reinforce the back end with Kane Richardson, so we put a premium on death bowling – that was the decision in a nutshell really," McDonald said today.

"And any time you leave out a player the stature of Mitchell Starc it's always going to create significant attention to that selection.

"The reality is we've got 15 players that arguably could be in the eleven, and those that miss out are going to be genuinely stiff."

He also said the decision to go with essentially a Test fast bowling attack in T20 cricket was based on knowledge of home conditions in which this World Cup is being played, and indicated that thinking might change with the next tournament to be played on vastly different surfaces.

Leg spinner Adam Zampa and seamer Josh Hazlewood finished the Super 12s phase as Australia's most successful bowlers with five wickets apiece, while Test spearheads Starc and Cummins ended up with three each.

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In the batting, Marcus Stoinis was the most productive with 126 runs from his four games followed by fellow allrounder Glenn Maxwell (118) and skipper Aaron Finch (107).

"For this World Cup, we felt those three bowlers – Mitch Starc, Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood – were the best suited to be part of the squad to navigate through the World Cup," McDonald said.

"I think it will be case by case (in the future).

"We've seen Nathan Ellis build in some depth, he was really impressive in the lead-in and Kane Richardson has been impressive in his own right.

"Riley Meredith is another one who's been exposed a couple of years back now in New Zealand, so we feel as though we're building some depth to that bowling department.

"It's just who we choose for what conditions and when."

McDonald dismissed suggestions Australia's elongated lead-in to the tournament had left players feeling fatigued, which had been cited as a possible reason for their poor start to the tournament with an 89-run loss to New Zealand.

In the wake of Friday night's loss to Afghanistan, Maxwell cited the schedule of 10 preparatory matches across the month prior to the NZ game as "probably the longest lead-in we've ever had" and added players breathed a sigh of relief when they were finished and the tournament proper began.

But McDonald claimed the lengthy preparation gave Australia a chance to get some game time into players who were returning from injury, and felt it provided "some positives" for trialling different playing combinations and scenarios.

"I think the scheduling is always a debate and a question, but that's no excuse for our performance throughout the World Cup," he said.

"I look at the positive around those games, that allowed some people to get up to speed, that were coming off injuries … and we played different structures at different times.

"You saw Cameron Green go up the top of the order and that played out at the end of the World Cup.

"We didn't take a lot of our players to Perth (for a preparatory match against England) for those reasons, we knew we were going back there a week later.

"We felt we navigated through that the best we could (but) each player will have an individual story around that."

McDonald indicated the Australia T20 squad – essentially the same outfit that secured the trophy in the UAE last year, with the addition of power hitter Tim David for leg spinner Mitchell Swepson – would likely undergo significant change for next T20 World Cup in the West Indies and USA in June 2024.

Of the current line-up, it is unclear whether Finch (aged 35), David Warner (35) and Matthew Wade (34) will be part of the set-up, while both Stoinis and Maxwell will be aged 34 and 35 respectively when the next World Cup gets underway.

But as McDonald observed, there is no pressing rush to reshuffle Australia's T20 player pool given there is no international 20-over cricket on the team's horizon until a scheduled series against South Africa in August next year.

"The short turnaround (from last year's World Cup) lent itself to a similar squad," McDonald said.

"We saw Tim David come in for Mitch Swepson – we felt that was the right play coming into the tournament and as I sit here right now, I still think it was the right play.

"But we'll go through what that looks like in terms of building towards the World Cup in 2024.

"There will be some natural turnover because of the gap, and also the age profile of our team so there will be some people who get their opportunities albeit next August when we play our next T20 game."

Finch's future as captain and opener is part of that potential turnover given he was unavailable for Australia's crucial final game with an injured hamstring, and has already called time on his career in the ODI format.

"I haven't really put much thought or time into that," McDonald said when asked if Finch had potentially played his final game in Australia colours.

"It's still a little bit raw on the back of a World Cup, but he's got some time to think about that.

"The Big Bash will determine probably his future, how he goes there, his performances, how his body is holding up.

"His body has failed him here, in terms of the hamstring strain that put him out of the World Cup and the next game's not until August next year so that gives him a lot of time to repair it if he's willing to go on.

"If not, then I'm sure over the next couple of weeks he'll have a think about that and call it, a bit similar to what he did with the one-day internationals."

With a replacement opener required at the top of Australia's batting order for the upcoming Dettol ODI Series against England later this month, as focus turns to next year's 50-over World Cup in India, McDonald said Test batter Travis Head is in the frame for that role.

Head dominated at the top of order in Warner's absence during a three-match ODI series in Pakistan earlier this year, and returned to the opening role for South Australia in yesterday's Marsh One Day Cup game against New South Wales where he scored 55 off 62 balls.

"I think Travis Head will get some opportunities with the retirement of Aaron Finch," McDonald said, adding further details will be known when Australia's ODI squad for the England games is named in coming days.

"We're excited to see what he can do in one-day cricket.

"We saw how he went in Pakistan against a world-class attack, he was able to take them on and his one-day domestic record is second to none.

"He's got big hundreds, and double hundreds."

As white-ball planning now turns to the ICC ODI World Cup next year, McDonald indicated Australia would name a near-full strength squad for the upcoming England series even though it will be played shortly before the NRMA Insurance Tests against West Indies begin at month's end.

"I think any time you get to play, it's with as full-strength squad as you can," he said.

"We saw that with the NZ series up north earlier, we were really keen to see what it would look like with as close to full strength as possible.

"We've got a little bit of a gap now because we've obviously exited (the World Cup) early so that allows us to play players that potentially – if we had have gone deep into this tournament – we wouldn't have.

"So I think you'll see a very strong side named in the coming days."

Men's T20 World Cup 2022

Australia squad: Ashton Agar, Pat Cummins, Tim David, Aaron Finch (c), Cameron Green, Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Kane Richardson, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Marcus Stoinis, Matthew Wade, David Warner, Adam Zampa

Australia's fixtures

Oct 22: Lost to New Zealand by 89 runs

Oct 25: Beat Sri Lanka by seven wickets

Oct 28: Match abandoned v England

Oct 31: Beat Ireland by 42 runs

Nov 4: Beat Afghanistan by four runs

Click here for the full 2022 T20 World Cup fixture