Last year, Tim Paine was about to quit cricket for good and take up a regular job at equipment manufacturer Kookaburra. He was not considered good enough even for the Tasmanian team and decided it was time to move on.
Then Tasmania got hit by a major crisis which resulted in the sacking of coach Dan Marsh. Paine, who had been out of the Sheffield Shield team for nearly a year, not only made a comeback in February 2017 but was even given a two-year contract.
Then in November, Paine received news he had emerged as the best available wicket-keeping option in Australia after Peter Nevill and Matthew Wade had failed to make an impression. So he was elevated to the role of Test wicket-keeper for the Ashes at home against England after not having played Tests in seven years.
Australia won the Ashes 4-0, with Paine doing admirably with the bat and ball as he scored 192 runs with one fifty from six innings plus 25 catches plus and a stumping.
Then all hell broke loose during the tour of South Africa in the aftermath of the ball-tampering scandal that resulted in bans for Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft. Australia got smashed 3-1 in the series and that heralded a period of considerable pain. Paine got the captaincy.
The ODI series against England was always going to be a tough test and Australia were further hampered by injuries to pace spearheads Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins. With five proven match-winners missing, Australia were asked to face the No1 ODI team in their backyard.
Australia are playing without a bunch of match-winners.
That England won 5-0 shouldn’t come as a surprise. Paine is doing whatever he can having just recently revived his professional career. The Australian team is in limbo and waiting for the reinforcements to come in once the pacers regain their fitness and Smith and Warner become available.
Australia will no doubt hand over the leadership to Smith as soon as he is available. That would have been the case even if Paine had done a wonderful job as a leader. However, the fact is Paine is putting in the hard yards when the team is clearly handicapped and lacking in vision or structure.
In reality, this is coach Justin Langer’s team. He is the one who had talked about sledging in the England series and how trash talk is part of their ‘culture’. He is the long-term visionary Australia have picked, not Paine. So if anyone is to be blamed, it’s Langer and not Paine even though in cricket it’s the captain’s fault and not the coach’s.
If you don’t like his leadership, it’s fine because he was anyhow getting ready for a regular nine-to-five life. It’s his country that asked him to drop that idea and save its teams, first Tasmania and then the national side. He is just keeping the seat warm until Smith returns.
