Former Test quick Geoff Lawson has debunked the theory that new captain Pat Cummins will struggle to balance his gruelling workload as a paceman with overseeing field placements and bowling changes.
A stranglehold was bucked when Cummins was on Friday named Australia’s 47th Test captain, becoming the first fast bowler to skipper the side since Ray Lindwall took control for one match against India in Bombay, now Mumbai, in 1956.
Tim Paine’s resignation amid a sexting scandal had paved the way for Cummins’ rise to captaincy.
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While legendary Pakistan fast bowler Wasim Akram and former South Africa quick Shaun Pollock both captained their respective teams, pace-bowling skippers in Test cricket history are rare and hotly debated.
Lawson, who played 46 Tests for Australia in the 1980s, concedes one challenge confronting bowling captains is having a teammate “cajole” them away from taking the ball.
But Lawson, who’s immense joy at Cummins’ rise to captaincy is palpable in a Sydney Morning Herald column, also goes in to bat for the bowling-captaincy brigade.
“David Warner will … be keeping an eye on the formations, ebbs and flows of the game. Warner and (Steve) Smith will not be afraid to cajole Cummins to the bowling crease or away from it, often cited as the most taxing judgment for a bowler-captain,” Lawson writes in the Sydney Morning Herald column.
“I would endorse that version, but multitasking isn’t that complicated; you are not thinking about field placements or who’s bowling into the wind in 40 minutes time when you’re running in to bowl: the focus is sharp, sharp on the intent of the delivery, constructing the over, working to get the next wicket.”
Paine, who captained Australia in 23 of the 35 Tests he played, was elevated to the role in the aftermath of the 2018 sandpaper affair.
Then captain Smith had received a two-year leadership suspension and the vice-captain of the time, Warner, had been dealt a lifetime leadership ban.
Lawson points out in his column “the underlying reason” why Paine beat everyone to the captaincy appointment.
“The Tim Paine keeper-captain era came about through most unusual circumstances in the wake of the sandpaper scandal, but the underlying reason Paine was elevated almost from retirement to captaincy was that the senior players in the Test team who were not suspended were bowlers,” Lawson writes.
“Cummins was the standout prospect way back then.”
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