Australia captain Steve Smith believes his team can capitalise on England’s inexperienced batting line-up in the forthcoming Ashes.
England’s quest to retain the urn begins in Brisbane next month when Joe Root’s men will bid to become the first since the side of 2010-11 to win an Ashes series on Australian soil.
Only four of those who will be the plane – Alastair Cook, James Anderson, Stuart Broad and Steven Finn – were part of that victorious unit, and a significant portion of this squad has limited experience of Test match cricket.
Opener Mark Stoneman has played in just three Tests, while James Vince and Dawid Malan, who will likely bat at three and five, have a combined 19 innings in international red-ball cricket.
Speaking to the BBC’s Stumped podcast, Smith said: “Dawid Malan and other guys have come in and played, I’m not entirely sure what order they will go with. Mark Stoneman will probably be at the top.
“They do have inexperienced players coming to Australia – hopefully they won’t be equipped for the fast and bouncy tracks compared to England and we can exploit them a little bit.”
The likes of Dawid Malan are still new to Test cricket.
England were unable to solve their issues at two, three and five over the summer series with South Africa and West Indies, which placed extra emphasis on Cook, Root and those batting lower down the order.
The tandem of Anderson and Broad remains pivotal from a bowling perspective too, and Smith wants to see plenty of that pair, and little of Cook and Root, across the five-match series.
“With regards to their batting, Alastair Cook and Joe Root are their two big players that we need to keep quiet,” Smith added.
“James Anderson and Stuart Broad are experienced – they have been here a few times so they know what to expect. We need to get those guys bowling a lot of overs – if we do that, hopefully we’ll have some success.”
