Australia's chairman of selectors George Bailey has confirmed that Steve Smith will not open the innings in the upcoming five-match Test series against India. Bailey also confirmed that Smith had expressed his desire to move back down the order even before Cameron Green got injured. There was a lot of speculation around Smith's batting position around six months before the India series as well as his numbers at the top weren't great.
Smith himself had advocated to open the innings after David Warner's retirement but he could only muster 171 runs in eight innings at an average of 28.5. Now that Green is injured and ruled out due to a back injury, Bailey has confirmed that Smith will move down to the middle order now for the upcoming series against India at home.
"Pat, Andrew and Steven Smith had been having ongoing conversations separate to the untimely injury to Cameron anyway. And I think Steve had expressed a desire to move back down from that opening position. Pat and Andrew have confirmed that he will be dropping back down the order for the summer. So, yeah, clearly we've got a No. 4 spot to fill and an opening spot to fill," Bailey said.
With Smith moving down the order, Australia will now need a specialist opener to partner Usman Khawaja. Moreover, they will also need a backup in the bowling attack with Green not playing a role in the series. However, Bailey pointed out that the Aussies have played Tests without a specialist all-rounder before. "They've done it in the past. You don't know how each Test is going to play out in terms of the workload for the quicks, or how much of an impact Nathan Lyon's going to have across the summer.
"We certainly have been and will continue preparing for Mitch Marsh to be able to bowl some overs as well, and that's been part of his management and build for the last couple of months. So there's other ways. There's teams that have played, and we've been a team that has played, without an allrounder in the past. There's more than one way to structure up a team," Bailey added.
