Are Australia on the verge of becoming the new West Indies of Test cricket?

There is a famous Thomas Keneally quote about how no Australian may have written Paradise Lost but Don Bradman did score a century before lunch at Lord’s. These days, the country of the Don cannot muster a hundred cumulatively. They manage to do what they have to before lunch though.

It may be a touch saccharine to consider the perils of Australia’s batting helter-skelter in the light of Bradman’s records, but there is a slimmer of rage behind this put-down. Australia during their glory years of 1995-2004 batted like they were in an enchanted spell. Scores of 500 and 600 were often enough for the Aussies to bat only once. It would be the opposition who would be expected to crumble as it batted twice. Matches could be finished in two-three days on account of the mountain of runs accumulated by the likes of Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, Ricky Ponting, the Waugh brothers and Adam Gilchrist.

These figures wrapped up their careers in the middle of the 2000s. Ponting lingered but he faded. At one point of time he was competing with Sachin Tendulkar for Test batting records. Tendulkar outlasted Ponting and, one hates to say it as an Australian supporter, outbatted him. There are no Ricky Pontings anymore.

No country for gritty batsmen

Michael Clarke retired not because of his dodgy back but because he had endured an Australian team that conceeded the Ashes by scoring 60 at Nottingham in 2015. There is the famous image of Stuart Broad with his hands pressed to his lips in amazement. He got 8/15 and he couldn’t believe how easy it was for him to keep getting wickets.

On the first day of Australia’s latest fall for 85 against South Africa in Hobart, Ian Healy pointed out to Clarke in the commentary box that the latter was present in Nottingham as well as in Cape Town in 2011, when the team was on the verge of securing another embarassing batting record – the lowest ever Test match score. At 21/9, they were five runs short of the score achieved by New Zealand against England in 1955. Peter Siddle and Nathan Lyon had to score more than the batsmen before them to take the score to 47. Similarly, Steven Smith scored 48 of Australia’s 85 runs in the first innings of the match at the Bellerive Oval.

Back in 2009 at Leeds, Mohammed Amir and Mohammed Asif had demolished Australia for 88. The Pakistani duo may have passed into disrepute, but it marked the start of the Australian downfall. It was jaw-dropping stuff then, as these two promising bowlers meted out swing that took on a bamboozling dimension. One could legitimately quote U2 then and say that “I can’t believe the news today”. One ached for the Australian team that had just passed its peak.

Glimmer of hope

Now, the peak has taken on a star like hue. There are only a handful Australian batsmen in the current batting line up who can give a glimmer of hope – David Warner, Smith and Adam Voges. The best thing about them is they evoke the good batsmen of the recent past. Warner is like Hayden in terms of impact, Smith is as greedy for runs as Clarke and Ponting were (Australia persist in having their best batsman as the captain) and Voges can be compared to Michael Hussey in terms of a late career and a Bradman-like average at the start.

All three of them are struggling like the rest of the squad. There are no lower-order heroics in the offing. Considering Bangladesh’s recent revival, the 201 Jason Gillespie scored against them seems like a distant dream. At least that is a break from the perpetual nightmares that have become intrinsic to the Aussies.

Clarke, in response to Healy’s teasings, could only grudgingly reply that he was indeed present in the playing XI at both times, as well as Leeds 2010. So were the other three batsmen, in name, if not in spirit. In Hobart, Australia need to score 500 runs to possibly draw the match. They would have to bat for two days to do that. There is a quiet despairing snigger when one wrote the previous sentence, such is the implausibility of that scenario.

Frustrating viewing

It is frustrating to see Australian batsmen not know when to grit it out. As if being attacking all the time is the Australian way. What’s the glory in hitting a four if you are likely to be out next ball playing a shot that was not in the reckoning? It is not the first time that the garb of the nation has been used as a justification for one’s erroneous stance.

There are other teams in the cricketing world who cannot bat well when the going gets tough, that is, the pitch is not tailor-made for batsmen. Australia eclipse the major cricketing nations in terms of failing to get a three-figure score. It is the shift between them now and them at their best that is startling.

Australia’s cricketing finances might be in a good position but their cricketing fortune isn’t. They are on the verge of being the new West Indies in terms of past achievements being hollowed. At least there would be something new about it.