After eating shit consistently throughout Australia’s dire, meek capitulation to India in the recent four-match Test Series, both Shaun and Mitchell Marsh have been somewhat mercifully 86’d from the squad that will take on Sri Lanka in a two-match series beginning in Brisbane on January 24th.
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In their place, a 20-year-old bolter by the name of Will Pucovski, who despite having just eight first-class games to his name has already lit the cricketing world on fire.
Pucovski, a Victorian lad, caught the attention of selectors in October after belting a masterful innings of 243 against Western Australia in a Sheffield Shield match. That innings made him the first Australian cricketer to score a Shield double-century before turning 21 since Ricky Ponting. That alone is incredible enough, but it becomes the stuff of legend when you consider it was made in the middle of Pucovski suffering a major depressive episode that saw him take an “indefinite break” from cricket immediately following the game.
In addition to the Marsh boys being binned, opener Aaron Finch and Peter Handscomb have also been summarily dropped from the side that lost a series to India on home soil for the first time ever.
In their place comes Pucovski and Queensland duo Joe Burns and Matt Renshaw, both making a return to the side after being previously dropped.
BREAKING: Australia’s Test squad for #AUSvSL series:
Tim Paine (c/wk), Josh Hazlewood (vc), Joe Burns, Pat Cummins, Marcus Harris, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Will Pucovski, Matt Renshaw, Mitchell Starc, Peter Siddle
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) January 9, 2019
Marnus Labuschange has been named in a side that will take on Sri Lanka in a three-day warm up game in Hobart that will likely determine whether or not he retains his spot in the team.
That all comes after a three-game ODI series against India that’s set to begin this Saturday at the SCG.
