Australia head coach Andrew McDonald has defended David Warner’s Ashes contribution, but refused to guarantee the opener will keep his place as the series heads to Old Trafford.
Warner enjoyed an encouraging Second Test at Lord’s, making his first half-century in England since 2015, but followed that up with scores of one and four in last week’s defeat at Headingley, falling to Stuart Broad for the 16th and 17th times in Test cricket.
Those failures have reignited the debate over the 36-year-old’s spot going into the Fourth Test in Manchester, which had been raging coming into the series.
Warner has already announced his intention to play through the Ashes before retiring at the end of the home series against Pakistan in January and the selectors’ decision is complicated by the fact that dropping the axe now could spell the end of the veteran’s Test career.
"You’ve also got to reflect on what the opening partnership’s been able to do across the six innings, and there’s been three 50-plus partnerships in there," McDonald said of Warner’s role alongside Usman Khawaja at the top of the order. "Albeit it didn’t function to its level [at Headingley], in some ways it’s done well so far in this series.
"We’ve got a lot to consider and a lot to weigh up.”
There is set to be a squeeze on places in the touring side ahead of the Fourth Test, with Mitchell Marsh having scored a superb first innings hundred in Leeds while deputising for the injured Cameron Green.
Marsh was playing his first Test in four years but now looks undroppable, and with Green set to be fit after recovering from a minor hamstring problem, McDonald admitted Australia face a “tough decision”.
Marcus Harris was the reserve opener in the Third Test squad but bringing him in as a like-for-like replacement for Warner would do nothing to ease the congestion elsewhere.
One option would be to drop Warner to make room for both Green and Marsh, possibly with Marnus Labuschagne moving up to open alongside Khawaja.
Labuschagne has experience opening the batting in domestic cricket but has spent the vast majority of his Test career at No3, where he averages 57.6, and the 29-year-old has looked out of sorts so far in this series. An alternative would be to move Marsh to the top of the order, where he has had success in white-ball cricket.
“Mitch Marsh has put a question to us no doubt,” McDonald said. “[But] he did pretty well down the middle-order. To put him up to open in English conditions would probably be something we haven’t discussed yet.
"But we do have some time between now and the next Test.”
The most radical move would see Australia play Warner and both all-rounders and instead leave out spinner Todd Murphy, who came into the side at Leeds in place of the inured Nathan Lyon.
Murphy was trusted to bowl just two overs during England’s run-chase on Sunday, but Australia have not gone into a Test match without a frontline spinner in more than a decade and McDonald poured cold water on the idea.
“We like a spinner,” McDonald said. “We like to have a balanced attack, and it gives you options, you can take pace out of the game, and you become one dimensional – whether it be with the right-arm bowlers or just pace bowlers in general – without the ability to turn to a spinner.
“We’ll have to assess that, but as it sits at the moment we do like to have the spinner in the team.”
