{"id":400808,"date":"2026-01-09T00:11:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T00:11:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/400808\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T00:11:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T00:11:09","slug":"mitchell-starcs-record-breaking-series-2025-season-as-35-year-old-champion-fast-bowler","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/400808\/","title":{"rendered":"Mitchell Starc\u2019s record-breaking series, 2025 season as 35-year-old champion fast bowler"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sixteen wickets in the first three innings of the series effectively won it for Australia, in the absence of Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood no less.<\/p>\n

Back-to-back man-of-the-match performances in Perth and Brisbane (where he changed the game with bat and ball) proved the undoubted highlights of easily the best campaign of Starc\u2019s career.<\/p>\n

In all, his 55 wickets in 2025 came at the best strike rate in Test history (minimum 50 wickets in a calendar year).<\/p>\n

As noted by Cricinfo in their annual review<\/a>, a wicket every 28.36 balls through 11 Tests in 2025 was the best on record, trumping Waqar Younis\u2019 1993 annus mirabilis (29.5) and Jasprit Bumrah\u2019s 2024 blitz (30.1).<\/p>\n

Starc played every Test available to him last year. No surprise when you consider he has missed just four of the 53 Australia have played in the past five years.<\/p>\n

Rarely has fast bowling seen such a combination of endurance and pace. Again, Cricinfo noted Starc\u2019s wicket-taking spree since turning 35 last January puts him in rarefied air.<\/p>\n

Only three bowlers \u2013 Courtney Walsh, Sydney Barnes and Glenn McGrath \u2013 have taken more wickets in a year at 35 or older. Champions all.<\/p>\n

But by that age, Walsh and McGrath were at least 10km\/h slower than Starc\u2019s cruising speed above 140km\/h. Barnes was significantly slower again.<\/p>\n

Starc\u2019s late-career adoption of the wobble seam<\/a> has made him a more accurate and particularly dangerous customer.<\/p>\n

\"Men<\/p>\n

Men of the moment: Ashes destroyers Mitchell Starc and Travis Head celebrate Australia\u2019s series victory.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n

New-ball swing, or lack of it, once dictated his fortunes until reverse swing could be found. Now, the former is a true strike weapon \u2013 bowled less often for more impact.<\/p>\n

It is Starc\u2019s wrist snap \u2013 a favourite of the new \u201cFox Bio\u201d toy in Fox Sports\u2019 coverage \u2013that generates his pace relatively efficiently, in turn allowing him to maintain it where someone like Jofra Archer can fade throughout a day.<\/p>\n

With 31 wickets, the Compton-Miller Medal in his keeping on Thursday and a 36th birthday looming, Starc noted his sacrificing of T20 internationals to preserve his body and prolong his Test career.<\/p>\n

Beyond a game of golf, a BBL appearance or two and taking in wife Alyssa Healy\u2019s own upcoming international summer, \u201cI haven\u2019t got too many plans,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Of course the 2027 Ashes tour, and five Tests against India beforehand, are there, but Starc won\u2019t be issuing a statement of intent this far out.<\/p>\n

In the form of his life though, he did have a point to make given \u201cthere\u2019s so much made about [this Australian XI\u2019s] age profile\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think at times through this series that experience has been a really good thing,\u201d Starc said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019ve seen guys prove that if you\u2019re still playing your role or if you\u2019re still good enough, it shouldn\u2019t matter how old you are\u2026 we\u2019ve seen the results this series.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sixteen wickets in the first three innings of the series effectively won it for Australia, in the absence…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400809,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-400808","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-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400808","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=400808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=400808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=400808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=400808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}