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<\/p>\nAustralia has yet to decide on its starting XI for this week\u2019s New Year\u2019s Test Ashes Test at the SCG, with captain Steve Smith failing to guarantee Todd Murphy\u2019s selection.<\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters in Sydney on Saturday morning, Smith declared that \u201call options are on the table\u201d for the series finale, suggesting that no decisions would be made until the national selectors inspected the pitch.<\/p>\n
The stand-in skipper was \u201cstill unsure\u201d on whether a strike spinner would be required, while he flagged the possibility of Australia picking two all-rounders, opening the door for Beau Webster\u2019s potential recall.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Watch The Ashes 2025\/26 LIVE and ad-break free during play with FOX CRICKET on Kayo Sports | New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1 ><\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI haven\u2019t had a chance to look at the wicket this morning, so all options are on the table currently,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n \u201c(The pitch) obviously hasn\u2019t had a great deal of sunlight, so need to check it out and see what it looks like. It still looked pretty green yesterday.\u201d<\/p>\n Pressed on selection, Smith added: \u201cCould play a couple of all-rounders, could play a spinner, could play no spinner. We\u2019ll figure it out once we see the surface and see which way we want to go about it.<\/p>\n \u201cNo-one\u2019s locked in yet. There\u2019s 13 or 14 guys on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2018WTF ARE YOU DOING?\u2019 Inside \u2018surrender\u2019 that shook Ashes… and Poms\u2019 \u2018mad\u2019 celebrations<\/a><\/p>\n \u2018IMPOSSIBLE NOT TO SEE\u2019: Stokes opens up on brutal Aussie reality, future of Bazball <\/a><\/p>\n The story of Usman Khawaja’s career | 04:47<\/p>\n Elsewhere, he stopped short of guaranteeing Cameron Green\u2019s selection, with the West Australian fighting to keep his spot in the Test side after an underwhelming six months with the bat. The 26-year-old has averaged 18.66 during this Ashes campaign with no fifties.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s got himself in on a few occasions and probably not gone on with it,\u201d Smith said of Green.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s probably the disappointing part about it. Starting your innings is actually your hardest thing. He\u2019s doing that pretty well and then just finding a way to get out. That happens with everyone, I\u2019ve been through the same thing on numerous occasions too. <\/p>\n \u201cWhat we know with Cam is he\u2019s a quality player. Not too long ago he contributed some really valuable runs in the series in the West Indies on some tricky surfaces. I think he was our leading run scorer there batting at three.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s batted in different spots, which also can\u2019t be easy when you\u2019re trying to sort of nail down one role.\u201d<\/p>\n He added: \u201cGreen hasn\u2019t got the runs he\u2019s wanted so far, but I think he\u2019s actually looked quite good at times too. <\/p>\n \u201cWe know he\u2019s a bright player. Every time he goes back to shield cricket, he smashes it. Regardless of what happens right now, we think he\u2019s got a really bright future.\u201d<\/p>\n Earlier on Friday, England confirmed a 12-player squad for the Sydney Test, with either spinner Shoaib Bashir or seamer Matthew Potts set for a recall.<\/p>\n The fifth and final Ashes Test between Australia and England gets underway at the SCG on Sunday at 10.30am AEDT.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia has yet to decide on its starting XI for this week\u2019s New Year\u2019s Test Ashes Test at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349437,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[428,7614,59356,1721,309,591,8222,107099,134940,8216,3604,7618,134939,20438,134937,134938,134936,101,134941,81753,132823,56,54,55,59371,5536,134942],"class_list":["post-349436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-australian-captain","tag-cricket","tag-england","tag-europe","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-home-soil","tag-matthew-potts","tag-melbourne","tag-northern-europe","tag-oceania","tag-picture-date","tag-press-conference","tag-robbie-stephenson","tag-seamer-xxx","tag-shoaib-bashir","tag-sports","tag-steve-smith-press","tag-steven-smith","tag-todd-murphy","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-usman-khawaja","tag-victoria","tag-xxx-changes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349436","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=349436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349436\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}