With Pat Cummins absent, Steve Smith will lead Australia in the Champions Trophy 2025, commencing with a clash against Ashes rival England on February 22 at Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore. In view of that, the veteran batter divulged about his uncertainness over Australia’s batting order for the marquee tournament.
Mitchell Marsh and Marcus Stoinis will not be there in the middle order, which has forced Australia to rethink its batting order. Recently, they lost to Sri Lanka in two hard-fought contests, and now the team has a different approach to settle upon. While talking about this, Smith asserted that players can flexibly shift batting numbers, depending on whether they bat or bowl first.
“We’ll wait and see,” Smith said to cricket.com.au. “It’s part of our discussions around flexibility and role-specific things throughout the tournament. One day I might be three, one day I might be four – we’ll see. It might also change from batting first to second, depending on what we want to do and what we’re chasing and what we’re trying to achieve.”
Dot discusses the dew, which plays an important role during the second innings of any match, and he would want to keep this in mind while forming the batting order as he believes players who play frequently in T20s might be better at handling a wet ball.
Smith said, “I think dew, in a big way, is going to come in during the back end of maybe the second innings, given that we want to load it up a little bit. I know that at that stage, there are five (fielders) on the field, but with a wet ball, particularly with guys who have played a lot of T20 cricket-who know what they can do with five out when the ball skids on nicely-it somewhat negates that. There are different scenarios that we can go down, but we’re going to stay flexible and adaptable throughout.”
