Injured Holland drops out of spin race for SCG Test

The list of contenders vying to be Nathan Lyon's spin sidekick later this summer has been lopped by one, with incumbent back-up Test tweaker, Jon Holland, set to undergo surgery next week.

Holland partnered Lyon when Australia last fielded two spinners in the same side, in the two-Test series against Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates last year, but will go under the knife to fix a chronic injury to the index finger of his bowling hand.

Australia often pick a second spinner in an extended squad for the Sydney Test, but the left-armer will be unavailable for this summer’s match at the SCG and is expected to miss about three months.

It means he will also miss the Melbourne Renegades' KFC Big Bash title defence.

While Holland has collected only eight wickets at 59 for Victoria in the Marsh Sheffield Shield this season, his 110 Shield victims at 26.16 since the start of the 2015-16 summer is the most by any spinner in the competition.

In Holland's absence, Ashton Agar and Mitchell Swepson along with veteran Steve O'Keefe would appear to be the frontrunners for a national call-up should selectors decide a second slow bowler is required to take on New Zealand at the SCG next month.

Those three bowlers are the only specialist spinners to have been given regular games in Shield cricket this summer.

Selection chief Trevor Hohns admitted this week that spin depth is a "bit of an issue", while Test legend Shane Warne has decried the common practice of Shield teams playing all-out pace attacks when pitches don't appear to be spin-friendly.

Australia may well elect not to pick a back-up spinner to face New Zealand in the third Domain Test, given their fast bowling stocks are plentiful and Marnus Labuschagne has proven to be a more-than-capable leg-spinner (he has 10 Test wickets at a respectable average of 40) and Steve Smith remains a handy part-timer.

Last month’s SCG pitch for the only Shield game it has hosted so far this season (a second match there got underway on Saturday) was dry and took turn. But conditions also assisted the current Test pace attack of Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins to gain considerable reverse swing as the trio (along with Lyon) bowled NSW to a 223-run win over Western Australia.

"There is a chance (we will bring a spinner in the for the SCG Test)," Hohns said on Tuesday.

"We have to have a look at the pitch we may receive in Sydney and we will be having a look at that in due course over the next couple of weeks.

"It is a bit of an issue for us, we're really focusing on our spin bowling department at the moment. We will be putting a couple of spinners on notice to make sure they’re doing extra work in case they’re required.

"I won’t nominate them now, because they haven’t been informed. We're going into a Big Bash period, so we’ll want anyone nominated to be doing extra work throughout the Big Bash series."

Australia's brains trust also have one eye on their next overseas Test tour, to Bangladesh in June, where pitches traditionally offer considerable assistance to slow bowlers. Australia played three specialist spinners - Lyon, Agar and O'Keefe – in their most recent Test there in 2017.

Prior to the ongoing round of Shield matches beginning on Saturday, Swepson and O'Keefe had each taken 10 wickets in four games (at 19 and 21 respectively) this season, while their economy rates (2.20 and 2.22 respectively) have also been impressive.

O'Keefe's international career had been presumed over two years ago but was a shock inclusion for the Chittagong Test in 2017.

Swepson was also in the squad for that tour, and the preceding one to the subcontinent in India in 2017, but is yet to make his Test debut.

He played his first international in a T20 against England last year.

"They're looking for a guy to partner Nathan Lyon … I obviously want to put my hand up to be that person," the Queensland leggie told cricket.com.au recently.

"Every spinner in state cricket wants to be that guy who can partner him. That's definitely a goal of mine.

"I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a goal of mine for selectors to look at me as the second spinner."