the recalled Marnus Labuschagne<\/a> to open alongside Khawaja. Weatherald\u2019s state team believe he is a genuine game-changer.<\/p>\n\u201cIt\u2019d be great to see him walking out for the first ball of the Ashes and playing a cover drive or a pull shot that goes for four,\u201d Tasmania\u2019s coach Jeff Vaughan said. \u201cI know there\u2019s some excitement around Australian cricket about the way he plays as well; the way he accumulates runs.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s positive and offensive and if there\u2019s a cover drive in the first over or the first ball of the Ashes, or a pull shot, I\u2019ve got no doubt Jake will back himself to play that and hit whoever it might be for four if the ball\u2019s on.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen he has got in, he\u2019s made big scores. He still misses out like every other player on the planet, but when he does get in he\u2019s one of those guys who makes big scores and gets them at a good rate, so it sets games up or helps the team win games of cricket. We\u2019re rapt for him.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Tigers got a strong example of what Weatherald can do to influence the outcome of a game during their Shield clash with Western Australia earlier this season. Starting their second innings one run behind WA in Hobart, the hosts were given an almighty kick along by Weatherald\u2019s 94 from 99 balls in conditions where no other player in the match passed 61.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat innings is a good example, I think, of what Jake does really well,\u201d Bailey said. \u201cHe counter-attacked. It was a wicket that had a little bit in it, others around him were finding it challenging.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe put pressure back on the bowlers and the way he did that, he drove nicely, he played off the back foot nicely, he was busy. So that\u2019s a good example of what he looks like at his best.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brendan Doggett and Sean Abbott are Perth-specific choices as back-up fast bowlers. Bailey indicated that Queensland stalwart Michael Neser remained well in contention to be part of the squad for the Gabba Test, particularly given it will be played with a pink ball.<\/p>\n
Loading<\/p>\n
Bailey said that Labuschagne had done everything the selectors wanted to see to earn a recall.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we\u2019ve seen is runs, time at the crease \u2026 I think there\u2019s an energy and method that, I think, is really attractive. We don\u2019t need to see any more \u2013 he\u2019s in the squad,\u201d Bailey said.<\/p>\n
News, results and expert analysis from the weekend of sport are sent every Monday. Sign up for our Sport newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s a really good selection because he\u2019s done well for Tassie over the last couple of years,\u201d Hussey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":["post-264121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264121","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=264121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}