Former Australian wicketkeeper-batsman Ian Healy was critical of Tim Paine and his team for their poor performance in the recent four-Test series after the hosts suffered an embarrassing 1-2 series defeat against the second-string Indian team at home.
Slamming the hosts, Healy said the Australians weren't hungry and played without real commitment against the young Indian cricket team and eventually suffered a shocking series defeat recently.
He also called for an improvement in fielding and attitude – which weren’t seen against India.
Healy said on SEN 1170's Drive: “They (Australians) played without real commitment. They weren't right in the contest often enough. There weren't hungry to convert 60 runs to 130 runs with individual totals.
It was a really strange performance by the captain, vice-captain, coach, and the coaching staff. Our fielding was hopeless. Two things I'd work with is fielding and attitude... and the rest will come back.”
Lashing out at Paine for his poor captaincy, the 56-year-old pointed out: “What I saw with 'Painey' in Sydney and Brisbane was that he mustn't be training hard enough. His wicket-keeping technique was off when he kept to Nathan Lyon.
I think his captaincy then suffered because he wasn't trying enough as the captain. That then opens it up to what is the vice-captain doing?”
He added: “Pat Cummins, where are your suggestions on the field? Not much innovation at all so that really does have to be discussed why all those people in that dressing room missed all that.”
However, Healy said the Australian side was not that bad, but they just played bad enough to lose the home Test series to the inexperienced Indian side.
He signed off by saying, “That coaching staff and senior players, they need to put a finger on why we just didn't play as well as should have and rectify it. This team isn't that bad. They just played bad enough to lose to India's second XI.”
(With PTI Inputs)
