There was an irony to the fact that Cameron Green’s catch made Beau Webster’s day look even better. Green had not had a good one, having earlier dived in front of Australia’s most prolific slip catcher to spoil a simple Steve Smith catch. It followed a poor day the day before, skying a pull shot after getting settled on 37, and a poor series before that. Then came Webster, an off-break swept into the deep, and Green’s long legs ate up the turf before crashing his body into a dive that gathered up the ball in its fall, the two Australians combining for what might be the tallest wicket in Test history.
There is usually only room for a single two-metre all-rounder in a team, unless they’re operating at specialist level in one discipline. Webster has spent this series on the sidelines of a team that backed Green as the better choice. The returns so far have been 149 runs at 21, and 4 wickets at 70. It has been telling that in Webster’s one opportunity, batting below Green in the order, he first outscored him while looking calmer and more organised with 71 not out, then showed his versatility by switching from seam-up to off-spin to nab three wickets.
If Webster’s success shows that he needs more opportunities in the Test side, doing so with slow bowling also showed the nonsense of both teams going into this match without a specialist spinner, having hallucinated a seaming minefield while inspecting a surface that went on to yield Australia 567 and England 384. The other irony is that had Australia picked one, the spinner would have played in Webster’s spot. Picking him at No 8, which became No 9 thanks to a nightwatch on the second evening, was far too low for his ability. It only happened so that selectors didn’t have to drop Green.
Green is the definition of a project player, but anyone who has written funding applications knows that it’s hard to get a funding renewal unless the results are clear. He first drew national-team attention as a tall teenage fast bowler, batting in the bottom four for Western Australia as per the norm. Then injury rehab saw him focus on batting, a skill that flourished with almost alarming speed and breadth. Suddenly he was up the order for his state, making not just hundreds but huge ones. The promise of the combination, of top-drawer bowling velocity mixed with batting class and run-hunger, was irresistible.
When Green prepared for his Test debut, facing India A in 2020, what stood out while watching at Drummoyne Oval that day was the nimbleness of his footwork. Down the pitch and moving back, not charging the bowling but simply arranging his giant boots in a neat pitter-patter to reach the pitch of the ball, shifting to defend as well as to attack. Early reports of his bowling noted similarly high quality: the speed, the movement through the air, the accuracy.
More than five years later, having played 37 of Australia’s 52 Tests in that time, neither Green’s batting nor bowling project the confidence that was observed before he started. Perhaps those observers were just too excitable about a prospect, perhaps learning his trade in the most demanding venue of its practice was too steep a task to set. The expectations may have been too high. But there was more than just talent and potential back then, there was ability that already existed. As of right now, Green comes across as a hothouse flower that has dried up in the terrarium. Perhaps the lamps were just too bright.
The road from here is unclear. The 20-over age means that Green will go to a T20 World Cup with Australia, then stay to earn millions of dollars in the IPL, rather than play the back half of the Sheffield Shield season for Western Australia. Four months trying to send a white ball into orbit without once trying to drop a red ball at his toes. Will that make him a better Test cricketer by the time Bangladesh visit the Top End in August? Will runs and wickets there be any indication of that? How about when visiting South Africa in October, against the pace battery of the World Test Champions, who rolled over Australia to take that title while Green made 4 and 0 and couldn’t bowl?
There is a public tendency to resent players who don’t live up to expectations, and Green doesn’t deserve to be resented. He does, though, deserve people to be clear that he has had a far easier path through Test cricket than most, on the basis of talent rather than achievement. Webster is the opposite, a player of more modest talent whose years of achievement let him scrap his way in. The chosen one and the journeyman, defined as of now by the opposite directions from which they’ve arrived at their Test careers. Green may yet have time to define himself differently, but he needs to earn that chance. Webster already has.
