{"id":108984,"date":"2025-09-02T11:29:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-02T11:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/108984\/"},"modified":"2025-09-02T11:29:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-02T11:29:07","slug":"cummins-concerns-as-captain-forced-to-prove-ashes-fitness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/108984\/","title":{"rendered":"Cummins concerns as captain forced to prove Ashes fitness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When asked if there were concerns surrounding Cummins&#8217; selection in spite of a lack of match action, Bailey pointed to the fast bowler&#8217;s consistency across a glittering career, having taken 309 Test wickets at a tick over just 22.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If it got to that stage (where Cummins played no cricket ahead of the Ashes) I still think that we&#8217;d be comfortable with Pat&#8217;s experience and skill level,&#8221; Bailey said.<\/p>\n<p>Australia aim to defend the Ashes on home soil, having retained the urn in a 2-2 series draw in England two years ago. Cummins took 18 wickets during the series, backing up his series leadin 21 scalps at 18 in Australia&#8217;s 4-0 win over the old enemy at home in 2021-22.<\/p>\n<p>The Aussies too will be forced into a rethink in the T20I format, with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.icc-cricket.com\/news\/fast-bowler-announces-t20i-retirement-as-australia-name-squad\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Mitchell Starc&#8217;s retirement in the format<\/a> on top of Cummins&#8217; injury leading to a bowling reshuffle.<\/p>\n<p>Recalled all-rounder Marcus Stoinis is one player who looks set to carry the bowling workload in the pair&#8217;s absence, alongside fellow quicks Sean Abbott, Ben Dwarshuis, Xavier Bartlett and Josh Hazlewood.<\/p>\n<p>Australian T20 Squad for New Zealand series:<\/p>\n<p>Mitchell Marsh (c), Travis Head, Matthew Short, Josh Inglis, Mitchell Owen, Marcus Stoinis, Glenn Maxwell, Tim David, Sean Abbott, Ben Dwarshuis, Xavier Bartlett, Adam Zampa, Josh Hazlewood, Matt Kuhnemann<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When asked if there were concerns surrounding Cummins&#8217; selection in spite of a lack of match action, Bailey&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[7529,428,1721,7530,50,52881,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-108984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-app-stream","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-highlighted-news","tag-news","tag-pat-cummins-05-08-1993","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}