Everyone knows that the fast bowlers currently sweating in 40-degree heat on unhelpful surfaces for Australia's ODI side in Pakistan are just keeping the places warm until the return of the "big three": Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc.
Australia's chair of selectors George Bailey admitted as much when the current squad was announced, saying of the trio: "The end goal is for all of them to hopefully be available and performing well at the coming 50-over World Cup."
But those bowlers will be aged 34, 36 and 37 respectively by the time that World Cup in southern Africa comes around in late 2027.
So Nathan Ellis's impressive performance in the second ODI in Lahore on Tuesday wasn't just significant in the context of the three-match series with Pakistan. Ellis was putting down a marker with his 4-33 off nine overs.
Ellis will be 33 at the time of the World Cup, and lacks the pace of Cummins, the metronomic bounce and height of Hazlewood, and the swing and left-arm angle of Starc.
But on unhelpful wickets he offers plenty, as he showed in the Gaddafi Stadium.
Discussing his art, Ellis said: "It's no secret that today it was pretty low and slow, and so it meant you can bring your length back and still hit the top of the stump. Me being a little bit of a shorter bowler allows me to do that in most places.
"I think we saw the cutters and the slow balls working a lot today, and the ball started to tail and reverse-swing through the 35- to 45-over mark."
Pakistan captain Shaheen Shah Afridi, a class bowler himself, was impressed by the Australian paceman.
"In the second innings the ball comes nicely on to the bat, but Nathan Ellis bowled well," Afridi said.
"He bowled stump to stump and that brought him success."
Australia's stand-in captain Josh Inglis, who had the perfect view as wicketkeeper, echoed Afridi's sentiments.
"I thought he bowled outstanding tonight," Inglis said.
"You can always call on 'Nello' on those sort of pitches, his variations are outstanding, and when you've got on-pace at 145 and then your slow balls at just over 100km an hour, it's really tough for batters."
Is this relevant, when the World Cup will be in South Africa on bouncy, green seamers? Not every game will be.
As Pakistan's Kiwi coach Mike Hesson said, defending the use of slow, low turners in this series: "The World Cup is jointly hosted. Zimbabwe and Namibia have venues where spin is a big factor.''
He added it was a myth that all wickets were quick and bouncy in South Africa.
There's still a long way to go, but Ellis has shown, as Scott Boland and Michael Neser did in the Test arena during the Ashes, there's more to Australia's bowling attack than the big three.
