His confidence will grow from this, and hopefully, he can transfer that into the longer format.<\/p>\n
It was a much-needed performance too. Australia were under the pump having already conceded the series and their recent ODI record against South Africa has been poor.<\/p>\n
The scars run deep when you think back to the famous 438 run chase in Johannesburg in 2006. Herschelle Gibbs\u2019 century turned into one of the most brutal assaults on an Australian attack in memory, and it was swift.<\/p>\n
I was on the bench that game, and I\u2019ll never forget when Ricky Ponting came into the dressing rooms after his own brilliant hundred and said: \u201cThe job\u2019s not done yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
There was a buzz \u2014 almost a sense of, \u2018we\u2019ve got this\u2019, because we\u2019d posted such a huge score \u2014 and maybe, just maybe, a feeling that it couldn\u2019t possibly be chased down.<\/p>\n
Sitting there, I remember thinking how glad I was not to be bowling, but at the same time wondering how I\u2019d have tried to get them out.<\/p>\n
![\"Travis](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/7d126bd1bff69c3921a818d7777cf0e7df043883.jpg\")
Travis Head was one of three Australians to make a ton. Credit: Albert Perez\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
The South African crowd was electric, the pitch was a road, and every ball felt like it disappeared into the stands. As a bowler, those are the days that test every bit of your craft. You execute your skills, stick to your plans, move to Plan B, then back to Plan A \u2014 and still you\u2019re fetching balls from over the fence.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the same in T20s today: each ball matters, but sometimes even your best just isn\u2019t enough. And there is absolutely no place to hide!<\/p>\n
That\u2019s why seeing Australia put together a dominant batting display in Mackay felt important. The one-day game is in a strange space globally \u2014 fighting for relevance at times \u2014 but when you see centuries piled on like that, with intent and class, you\u2019re reminded why it still matters.<\/p>\n
The players looked hungry, and the ground itself played its part. A good mate of mine travelled down from Townsville with his kids to watch the match.<\/p>\n
They\u2019re big cricket fans and he said the experience was unreal \u2014 not just the cricket, but the chance to be in that atmosphere, see the best players in the world up close, and be part of a crowd that felt invested in the contest.<\/p>\n
He mentioned how great the ground in Mackay looked up close, saying it was every bit worthy as an international venue.<\/p>\n
His one lament was that Townsville, also my home town, doesn\u2019t have the lighting infrastructure to host day-night internationals.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the reality for a lot of regional centres in Australia. Mackay got the nod because they can run a game under lights, but wouldn\u2019t it be something if Townsville could host these occasions as well?<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a whole community of cricket fans there, families who would fill the stands, and kids who would walk away dreaming about being the next Head, Marsh or Green.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the beauty of taking games to smaller towns. For all the big-stadium glitz of the major cities, these matches matter just as much \u2014 if not more \u2014 in the regions.<\/p>\n
They bring cricket closer to communities who don\u2019t often get the chance. They give young cricketers a live look at the standards required at international level. And they remind us that cricket is, at its best, a game for everyone \u2014 not just the big-city crowds.<\/p>\n
For Australia, the challenge now is to build on that Mackay performance.<\/p>\n
Too often in recent years, especially against South Africa, we\u2019ve seen one good result offset by inconsistency.<\/p>\n
But if the hunger shown by Head, Marsh and Green can be carried forward, then there\u2019s every chance the ODI side can build some belief again.<\/p>\n
And maybe one day Townsville will get its lights, and the next big one-day memory might come a little closer to home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The last one-day match in Mackay had everything you want from an ODI: centuries, a vocal crowd, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,1721,588,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-101761","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cricket","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cricket","11":"tag-opinion","12":"tag-sport","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}