🔗 Share this article Australia Enter The Ashes Series with Transition Abruptly Forced Upon an Older Team The historic Ashes series could provide one cause for celebration, but this series will also see the Australian team host a greater number of birthdays than Timezone in the nineties. New boy Jake Weatherald had his thirty-first birthday a day prior to the squad was named. Nathan Lyon celebrates 38 the day before the Perth Test. Beau Webster reaches 32 just before Brisbane, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on the second day in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood becomes 35 on the fifth day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 by the time January is out. Ageing Team Interest Builds For two or three years there has been growing fascination with the age of this side and especially the bowling attack. It is rare to have almost every player near a Test side being over 30, except for novelty-sized mascot Cameron Green and custody-weekend visitor Sam Konstas. But it wasn't necessarily true that older age was a problem: a Test squad featuring a four-man attack with 1,568 wickets between them is hardly a weakness, and it makes sense that all of those bowlers are well into their careers. I've never felt this sure at the beginning of an Ashes tour | Mark Ramprakash Perhaps what most amplified the talking point is that the reserve players over that time, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also deep into their thirties. Younger bowlers have floated into teams – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before vanishing for years with injuries, meaning there has been no obvious replacement plan. Transition Forced by Injuries So far, that hasn't been an issue, as the Big Four plus Boland have kept on performing. Any side knows that having a group of similarly-aged players might mean a group of simultaneous retirements, but so far change has remained theoretical: a train that would indeed be arriving the mountain when she comes, but one that had not become visible. Now, suddenly, transition is upon them, imposed on this Australian squad in the space of a few weeks. The back injury to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would likely only miss the opening match, was the team management assessment, and as the first bowling change behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could easily be covered for by Boland. Mitchell Starc and Brendan Doggett during a training session in Western Australia in the build up to the first Test. Image: AAP But now that Hazlewood has gone down with a hamstring injury, the balance experiences a far greater shift with two key bowlers missing rather than a single one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two accurate right-arm bowlers give the stability and precision that enables Starc’s left-arm speed and movement to be used more as a weapon of attack. Missing both of them means a major adjustment in the balance of the team. Boland taking the new ball is not unusual in his first-class career, but he has been so effective in Test matches entering the attack after seven or eight overs of initial onslaught. Now he’ll probably have to be the man up front. Newcomer Confronts Pressure Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at 31 years old himself won’t be an overawed youth, but he might become an nervous thirty-one-year-old. A full stadium crowd, partly English, for the opening Test of a deliriously anticipated Ashes series will not make for an simple first match, no matter how many media stories portray him as laid-back. He could be wheeled onto the field on a banana lounge and still be nervous. Register to our cricket newsletter Who knows, it might all go swimmingly for this revamped bowling lineup. It might not. What is notable is how quickly Australia have transitioned from the surety of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the uncertainty of Starc, Lyon, mumble mumble. It's unclear what new injuries the opening match may cause. Who knows whether Cummins will be good to go for the Brisbane Test, and good to back up after Brisbane, given how tricky stress injuries can be. It's uncertain how long Hazlewood might be out, with a track record of getting injured early in series and a history of minor injuries turning into longer layoffs. Future Unclear The back half of the series may witness the primary four bowlers reunited and all going well. Or it might see transition setting in much sooner than the stretch goal of 2027 in the UK. Not through Neser, who is seemingly next in line and could be a excellent day-night Brisbane choice, but beyond that with choices uncertain. Sean Abbott was in the initial squad, though he’s now also injured and has never played a Test match. Richardson has just had his injury-prone arm repaired, and this format is not the place for easing into one’s work. Beyond them lies the real unknown, and amid it all opportunity for the opposing side. You can sense that train approaching, coming around the bend, and the English team ain’t seen the success since they can't recall when.