Former Australian captain Ricky Ponting has suggested 20-year-old Cameron Green take the place of Cameron Bancroft in the Australian squad.
Green is a fast-bowling all-rounder who plays for Western Australia in Australia’s premier domestic competition, the Sheffield Shield. He has the ability to consistently bowl over the 140kmph mark. Also, three of his last five performances with the bat have yielded 87*, 121* and 126.
Ponting told cricket.com.au, “Cameron Green is probably the in-form batsman in the country. It'd be a pretty left-field decision to make because he's been batting so low for WA. But he's not doing much wrong, he's an exciting talent, and maybe to just include him and have him around the squad and give him a taste of what it's like might not be a bad thing.”
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“He's very young and very raw, but what he's doing in Shield cricket suggests there's a whole lot of talent there with both bat and ball. He's someone we've got to keep an eye on for the next couple of years, and if we can fast-track him and get him into the set-up sooner rather than later, it wouldn't be a bad thing. The timing could be right. I know there's a great vibe around the team, the leadership side of things is really strong and culturally it's really strong. So to introduce someone new like that, a young guy, it would be a good time,” he added.
Cameron Bancroft had also made his comeback to the Australian side after serving his ban for ball-tampering. However, he could make big scores and soon was dropped out of the team. Ponting believes that his poor run of form is due to some technical issues. Green will be a good replacement for Bancroft according to the former Aussie skipper.
The 44-year-old said, “I think Bancroft needs to have an extended run at some Shield cricket and try and work some deficiencies out. There's obviously something technically wrong there that he's got to work on. I know he has been working hard on his game because I watched him up close and personal during the Ashes, but there's obviously some other things that are going wrong.”
(Inputs from cricket.com.au)
