What do you do with Shane Watson?

Jan 13, 2001
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With Watto injured again, the question must be asked what do you do with him. Obviously what has been done in the past does not work as he spends as much time out injured as playing.

I beleive that we need to overhaul the fitness staff completely and instead of them doing a fitness plan for bowlers and batsmen learn to manage players a lot better. For instance Geelong FC seems to of got the balance right and had all their senior players fit when they needed them by nursing them at various times through the year and designing training programs for each player to help keep them fit & fresh whilst minimising the risk of injury. I accept that fast bowlers are more prone to injury but what is happening at the moment is beyond a joke we have a perfectly good pace attack sitting in the stands injured this test with Watson, Harris, Cummins (all automatic slections) out with Johnson and Bollinger (you'd pick one of these two) also out.
 
It's hard because he's been such an important bowler - that said, it's mainly because the rest of our bowling attack hasn't been consistent enough. If we can get the bowling lineup right and firing, we can bring him back as a batsmen who bowls a bit. That may also help his batting concentration and allow him to convert fifties to hundreds.
 
R

Rumblah#16

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Needs to move down to four. Will mean he can continue being an elite bowler for longer spells and not have to bat straight away.

Will absolutely slay teams at four, much like Kallis did/ does.
 

THRILLHO

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Apr 17, 2008
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Needs to move at four, but will stay in the opening position.

Marsh
Ponting
Clarke
Hussey

Even if Marsh moves into the opening slot with Khawaja that means Ponting will have to go back to three.

Selectors will not make any decision that is remotely difficult and will stick him in the opening slot.
 
Apr 7, 2010
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down to 4. down to 6 eventually. of course the problem there is A) Watson is useless against spin. Although at least he knows he's useless so if he gets a bad ball he just goes for it. and B) He doesn't really make much attempt to keep his drives down. Coming in at over 50 instead of 1 with an older ball might maybe mean more of those drives get caught.
 
I know Khawaja's the next batsman in line, but given it's Sydney, don't be surprised to see Glenn Maxwell brought into the squad as a possible replacement. He pro ides an all-round option that the selectors love and I reckon the selectors would like to have a look at him before the tour of India. He could be our Samit Patel except, y'know, not a fat spud.
 
It won't happen but I would almost tell him to pack it in playing Tests. A far more damaging player these days in the shorter form and a lot less workload. His body clearly can't handle Test cricket.
 
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