Australia selectors' local knowledge of Brisbane makes first Test team the right XI for a game on a result pitch

All three of Australia’s Test selectors live in Brisbane, where England arrived on Sunday afternoon in good time - and well-acclimatised for once - for the opening Ashes Test on Thursday. Since announcing their squad, Australia’s selectors have been criticised for some surprising choices, but their local knowledge - both of the unique conditions at the Gabba and the sub-tropical climate - may well prove a decisive factor.

Greg Chappell is the most famous name on Australia’s selection panel: the country’s finest batsman after Sir Donald Bradman until Ricky Ponting. He tried coaching but, like all the most talented players, found it hard to comprehend the difficulties of lesser mortals. Chappell has found his niche, however, in identifying players coming through the junior ranks. Cameron Bancroft, Australia’s new opening batsman, who has just carried his bat against the Test-class attack of New South Wales and followed it with a double-hundred for Western Australia, must have impressed Chappell with the orthodoxy of his technique. 

Darren Lehmann, Australia’s coach, is another selector. Although he played for South Australia, he finds it convenient to live in Brisbane because it is the site of Australia’s National Cricket Centre. Yesterday Lehmann, like everybody else who has spoken on the subject, said he was “excited” at the prospect of the Ashes, adding that he had to leave the Australian selection meeting for only a few seconds while his son Jake was discussed, so he knew Jake was not going to be picked as the new number six.

Least known of Australia’s three Test selectors is Trevor Hohns, because he only played seven Tests as a wristspinner in the 1980s - but he happens to be the most successful chief selector any Test country has ever had. Australia under his aegis won the 1999 and 2003 World Cups - and 16 successive Tests. Hohns played at the Gabba for Queensland for almost 20 years, ending as their captain, as Chappell had been.

A year ago when Australia were in crisis after going 2-0 down at home against South Africa, and after Hohns had stepped down as chief selector, CA’s response was to re-install him. Immediately a couple of ordinary players were dropped; new players were brought in such as Peter Handscomb, who set a world record by not being dismissed for fewer than 50 in his first seven innings; and the next five Tests were won.

Hohns, known as “Cracker”, used to run a tailor’s outfitting business. Australia’s team for the Gabba has also been neatly tailored. It would be the wrong team for a five-day Test on a flat pitch, because the risk of one of Australia’s three pace bowlers breaking down through overwork would be high. It is the right eleven for a game on a result pitch, which will start fresh after heavy rain over the weekend and will be interrupted by showers, because Australia have packed their batting with their six most in-form batsmen, supported by Tim Paine, who is - for all the interruptions to his career through injury and the criticism - a classy wicketkeeper-bat.

England’s seamers though will also be suited to the Gabba in rainy weather. Give them “a deck” and England’s four - if they are James Anderson and Stuart Broad, Chris Woakes and Jake Ball - can match Australia’s three. In these circumstances Australia’s superiority in off-spin will count for much less than on a flat pitch in fair weather.

In their last two practices before the Test, to support their seamers, England have to work on their close catching with their new line-up of Jonny Bairstow, Alastair Cook at first slip, Joe Root at second, Dawid Malan at third, James Vince at gully and Mark Stoneman at short-leg. The days of chivalry have gone however: instead of one team practising one day in the morning and the next day in the afternoon, Australia have booked both of the morning slots at the Gabba.

If England arrived on this tour superior in one department it was wicketkeeper-batting, but that was when Matthew Wade was Australia’s incumbent. Tim Paine is steadier of temperament, less voluble and volatile, and Bairstow will have his work cut out to beat his counterpart. Bairstow's batting preparation was hindered by facing nothing but spin in his innings of 19 in the last warmup in Townsville, and his wicketkeeping by an injury to the middle finger of his left hand.

“It’s exciting, isn’t it?” Bairstow said about arriving in Brisbane. “We’re excited about the prospect of the up-and-coming first Test - and if it rains it rains, and if it doesn’t it doesn’t.” But this does make a change from some England parties that have turned up in Brisbane on a Monday evening, often straight from Tasmania, inadequately prepared, when their mood could have been summed up as nervous or apprehensive.

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