{"id":917923,"date":"2026-10-06T07:44:17","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T07:44:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/917923\/"},"modified":"2026-10-06T07:44:17","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T07:44:17","slug":"south-africa-vs-australia-test-series-cooper-connolly-promises-aggressive-approach-if-selected-to-play-in-first-test-in-durban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/917923\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa vs Australia Test series: Cooper Connolly promises aggressive approach if selected to play in first test in Durban"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Daniel<\/p>\n

October 6, 2026 \u2014 6:32pm<\/p>\n

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Durban: Cooper Connolly has declared his aspiration to emulate the batting pyrotechnics of Travis Head as he prepares for a possible Test match call-up on what\u2019s expected to be a turning pitch at Kingsmead this week.<\/p>\n

Recently turning 23, Connolly has been a consistent presence in Australian squads over the past 18 months, granted multiple opportunities to learn \u2013 and to fail \u2013 in foreign conditions as he moulds his game.<\/p>\n

\"CooperCooper Connolly celebrates scoring a one-day century for Australia in Bangladesh in June.AP Photo\/Mosaraf Hossain<\/p>\n

Cameron Green is under a cloud due to an abdominal strain, meaning there may well be a middle-order spot available in Durban, with Connolly likely up against the more seasoned Nic Maddinson, 34, for a spot in the absence of Josh Inglis (broken finger).<\/p>\n

Selectors George Bailey and Andrew McDonald will thus have a clear choice between youth and experience.<\/p>\n

With his left-arm spin as a useful second string, Connolly has firm views about how he wants to play, and fellow left-hander Head looms large in his thinking.<\/p>\n

Editor’s pick\"Cameron<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s unbelievable. Over the last couple of years, I\u2019ve watched him play Test cricket, and he\u2019s been that aggressive and changed games. And that\u2019s something I want to be,\u201d Connolly said. \u201cThere might be time and a place where the game is asking something else, but I watch him a little bit and try to understand how he goes about it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re slightly different players, but that\u2019s sort of how I want to approach my game. Similar to Trav, I want to take the game on. I want to score runs, I want to impose myself. I want to be aggressive. I want to put the bowlers back under pressure.<\/p>\n

\u201cSpeaking to Trav over the last year and a bit, just understanding how he wants to go about it and how he thinks out there. I think Trav\u2019s someone that stands out for me, how I want to play my game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Connolly was just 21 when he made his Test debut in Sri Lanka in early 2025, and at the time he was still wrestling with how to handle spin bowling in the initial phase of his innings. He\u2019s used those experiences to learn, beginning a routine of making regular batting notes at home in Perth before each assignment.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll sit down at home in Perth … and write down what I want to achieve out of this,\u201d he said. \u201cI first started it before the [2026] IPL because I\u2019d obviously had a tough period before then. It was just [contemplating] what do I want to get out of this, whether I\u2019m playing or not playing. How can I come back a better cricketer?<\/p>\n

\"AustraliansAustralians Cooper Connolly and Xavier Bartlett were able to share the taste of victory for Punjab in the IPL this year.AP<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if I play, what\u2019s my method, and how do I want to do it? What are some key words that are going to help me approach every innings the same, so it\u2019s not searching for things in every innings. It\u2019s consistency throughout the whole series.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I went in to Sri Lanka a little bit raw and trying to still play the same way, where it sometimes doesn\u2019t work because it spins a little bit more, and you get beaten and stumped or something like that. Committing to a method, for me, in those conditions has been the big one.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tellingly, the routine caught the interest of white-ball skipper Mitchell Marsh, who told Connolly he wished he had been similarly fastidious as a younger player.<\/p>\n

Editor’s pick\"Nic\u00a0Maddinson<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Bison\u2019 (Marsh) said to me \u2018the one thing I regret is not writing down notes when I was your age because it\u2019s something to look back on when things were going well\u2019,\u201d Connolly said. \u201cUnderstanding that yeah, these things that you look back on and have helped you progress to the cricketer you are now, you look back and you go, OK, that\u2019s how I played the game then, and you don\u2019t lose that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s probably the one thing that stood out when Bison said that to me. I was like, yeah, that\u2019s not a bad idea, and I\u2019ve already been doing it, but it\u2019s just something that sort of needed a little bit of reinforcing to understand that the older guys actually wish they did it when they were younger.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like Steve Smith 15 years ago, Connolly understands that his spin bowling might help him in a tight selection squeeze, but maintains that ultimately it will be his batting that flourishes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI see myself as a batting all-rounder,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t used to put a lot of time into it. I just thought left-arm spin was pretty easy, but there\u2019s actually a bit more to spin bowling.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s just understanding that my batting is my one wood, so making sure I\u2019m still knuckling down and nailing all that. But then on the spin side, making sure I\u2019m progressing my bowling and I\u2019m ready for any sort of situation, any role … and just being as versatile as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"DanielDaniel Brettig<\/a> is The Age’s chief cricket writer and the author of several books on cricket.Connect via X<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"October 6, 2026 \u2014 6:32pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":917924,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":["post-917923","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\/917923","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=917923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917923\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/917924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=917923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=917923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=917923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}