Key posts
Maxwell out as Australia bowl first
Pat Cummins wins the toss and sends Bangladesh in to bat.
Glenn Maxwell IS out for Australia, resting up after his Mumbai exertions. So is Mitchell Starc, meaning Sean Abbott plays his first game of the tournament after spending a lot of time substitute fielding and net bowling.
Steve Smith is back in the team after a bout of vertigo kept him out of the Afghanistan game and he’s listed to bat at four, after Travis Head, David Warner and Mitchell Marsh. Marnus Labuschagne is at five – it remains to be seen whether he will keep his spot against South Africa when Maxwell comes back. Marcus Stoinis is the other player needing to have an impact today.
TEAMS
Australia: David Warner, Travis Head, Mitchell Marsh, Steve Smith, Marnus Labuschagne, Josh Inglis, Marcus Stoinis, Sean Abbott, Pat Cummins (capt), Adam Zampa, Josh Hazlewood.
Bangladesh: Litton Das, Hasan Tamim, Najmul Hossain (capt), Mushfiqur Rahim, Mahmudullah Ryad, Tawhid Hridoy, Mehidy Hassan, Mehedi Hasan, Nasum Ahmed, Taskin Ahmed, Mustafizur Rahman.
While we are on Sri Lanka…
Not for the first time political turmoil has followed Sri Lanka’s underperformance at the World Cup. The Sri Lankan government – always closely intertwined with the cricket board – responded to the team’s elimination by sacking the board en masse.
That event triggered a response by the International Cricket Council, “suspending” Sri Lanka Cricket due to overt government interference. Now this action was cause for plenty of debate, given the fact that government interference in cricket tends to be the rule rather than the exception in many parts of the world: not least Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover, or in India itself where the BCCI has operated in lockstep with Narendra Modi’s ruling BJP party.
However in practical terms, the suspension acts more as a warning. Sri Lanka are not scheduled to play any more cricket until December, and there are no ICC funds due to go into the coffers of the board until January next year. In other words, the message will be to get the house in order quickly.
Timed out controversy
In the aftermath of the biggest story surrounding Bangladesh this tournament, Shakib Al Hasan’s decision to push an appeal for timed out against Sri Lanka’s Angelo Mathews, a voice of opposition arose from an unlikely quarter.
Allan Donald, the former South Africa spearhead, is serving as Bangladesh’s bowling coach and made no secret of his displeasure about Shakib’s sustained appeal against Mathews, which helped his side register one of just two wins this tournament.
Sri Lanka’s Angelo Mathews, right, talks to umpires after he was declared timed out during the World Cup match between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.Credit: AP
“It was disappointing to see. I can understand Shakib taking his chance. His words were ‘I was doing everything to win’. You can sense in my voice that I don’t like it,” Donald had said after the game.
“I don’t like that sort of thing. It was really difficult to watch that unfold – one of Sri Lanka’s all-time greats walking off the field without a ball bowled to him being given out for time. That’s where I stand on that.
“You talk about the respect and the dignity for each other and for the game, the spirit of the game. I just don’t want to see things like that. That’s just me. I just don’t want to see that sort of thing in our game where, okay, someone was sharp out there and said ‘well, you can appeal’. I was like, ‘really – this is not going to happen, this cannot be happening, this can’t be happening’.”
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Donald was soon given a rap on the knuckles by the Bangladesh board for stepping out of line with the captain’s actions.
“He could have given his personal views at a later time,” a BCB official told ESPNcricinfo. “He is part of the team management so when the team takes a decision, speaking about it publicly is a breach of the code of conduct. He could have spoken about it within the team or he could have spoken directly to the player. He could have informed the BCB, but not in public.”
Donald, it turns out, is leaving his job at the end of the World Cup. Shakib, meanwhile, is out of this game with a fractured finger.
Australia set to face Bangladesh in Pune
Welcome to our coverage of Australia v Bangladesh in Pune. It’s been a few days of taking stock for the Australians after Glenn Maxwell’s Mumbai miracle, which secured third place on the World Cup table and set up a semi-final meeting with South Africa on Thursday.
This match, while having no impact on the semi-final standings, will be an important last staging post for Australia. Four years ago the team then led by Aaron Finch suffered injury setbacks before and during their final game, against South Africa at Old Trafford, meaning they rather limped into the semi-final against England that Eoin Morgan’s side went on to win comfortably.
This time around, Pat Cummins will be hopeful of a strong performance to carry into the knockout phase. It will help if there’s another big score for David Warner, who as Malcolm Conn reports, has reaped the benefits of a bespoke bat with a very low middle, the better to handle the lower bounce of south Asian pitches.
Some changes to the team are expected. Maxwell may miss in order to ensure he is fully recovered from the severe cramping he suffered in Mumbai, while one of the other quick bowlers, possibly Mitchell Starc, is some chance of being rested. Sean Abbott and Cameron Green would come in if that is the case.
