Career-best haul won't shift Hazlewood's focus

On the strength of career-best first-class bowling figures at the Adelaide Oval on Monday, Josh Hazlewood could be safely considered a certainty for the summer's opening Test match later this month.

But Hazlewood refuses to look that far into the future, having learned some harsh lessons during the past 12 months in which he succumbed to a back injury and the whims of selection.

The 28-year-old found his rhythm rapidly returning throughout the course of the Marsh Sheffield Shield match against South Australia, which the Blues won by 96 runs having claimed the home team's last nine wickets in just over two sessions today.

Hazlewood was the principal architect of his team's third consecutive outright win, and his 6-35 from 18.4 immaculate overs bettered the 6-50 he claimed in the 2013-14 Shield final against Western Australia in Canberra.

He conceded that he didn't quite land the ball on his preferred length in the first innings at Adelaide, having played just one first-class game since he helped spearhead Australian's retention of the Ashes in the UK earlier in the year.

And even though the component parts of his bowling 'clicked' into place in the second innings, which began with his dismissal of SA opener Jake Weatherald from the second ball he delivered, Hazlewood dares not pre-suppose his selection for the first Domain Test against Pakistan at the Gabba from November 21.

That's because he clearly recalls the disappointment he felt when the stress fracture in his back cost him a berth in Australia's ICC World Cup squad, and a surfeit of fast bowlers kept him out of the first Ashes Test at Edgbaston even though he was fully fit.

"I never look too far ahead, that's usually when cricket bites you pretty tough," Hazlewood said after the match.

"So I always just look at the next game and what next week brings, and just go from there."

While it was the workload Hazlewood undertook during last summer's four-Test series against India that eventually broke his back, it was the slight changes he made to his bowling action a year earlier that precipitated the injury.

He revealed that the prevalence of left-handed batters in England's top-order during the 2017-18 Ashes campaign in Australia led him to marginally alter the angle from which he delivered the ball.

Hazlewood finished that five-match series, which Australia won 4-0, with 21 wickets at 25.90 but his success came at a great residual cost.

"I got into some bad habits, probably bowling to England here when they had a lot of left-handers," Hazlewood said, recalling his battles with Alastair Cook, Mark Stoneman, David Malan and Moeen Ali.

"I kept falling away, and it kept getting worse and worse and I got a bit more lateral flex than what I like (in bowling action) and that was the cause for the stress fractures basically.

"I probably wasn't getting all my momentum going at the target, so I just did some work on that with New South Wales (bowling coach) Andre Adams … getting everything back in line.

"And I guess I'm getting the benefits now, everything's feeling really nice.

"I'm using all my energy, there's a bit more on the ball and I'm feeling good."

Hazlewood acknowledged he felt "a bit rusty" in the first innings against SA but he benefited from sending down almost 43 overs across four days at Adelaide Oval, where he will return later in the month for the second Test against Pakistan following the series opener in Brisbane.

The fact that the Adelaide Test – and the match that immediately follows, against New Zealand in Perth – are day-night matches that utilise the pink ball does not faze Hazlewood, even though he and his teammates won’t have a chance to play in a match with the pink ball before the Tests.

Instead, his warm-up will be the next Shield match for the Blues (against WA starting at the SCG next Monday), before the Test players convene in Brisbane two weeks from now.

Provided he's named in the Test squad, of course.

"We've played quite a few games now with the pink ball," Hazlewood said in playing down the lack of day-night match practice ahead of the Tests.

"It obviously does a little bit more at night, if anything.

"Especially at Adelaide, where he (ground manager Damian Hough) has got the wicket pretty much perfect.

"As we saw in the Ashes (in 2017-18), if you've got a new ball at night it can do a few tricks but I've bowled plenty with that so I don’t think it's an issue.

"You probably bowl a touch fuller out here and then in Perth (where Australia play New Zealand from December 12) you also try and bowl a touch fuller with a bit more bounce over there.

"So that's something to work on."

Domain Test Series v Pakistan

Australia squad: TBC

Pakistan squad: Azhar Ali (c), Abid Ali, Asad Shafiq, Babar Azam, Haris Sohail, Imam-ul-Haq, Imran Khan Snr, Iftikhar Ahmed, Kashif Bhatti, Mohammad Abbas, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Musa Khan, Naseem Shah, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Shan Masood, Yasir Shah.

Warm-up match: v Australia A, November 11-13, Perth Stadium (d/n)

Warm-up match: v Cricket Australia XI, November 15-16, WACA Ground

First Test: November 21-25, Gabba (Seven, Fox & Kayo)

Second Test: November 29 – December 3, Adelaide (d/n) (Seven, Fox & Kayo)