Australia To Add Lee To Boxing Day Arsenal

The Age

Wednesday December 15, 1999

MARTIN BLAKE

ADELAIDE

With its opposition's jugular exposed, Australia is poised to augment its weaponry with the raw pace of Brett Lee for the Boxing Day Test match against a teetering India.

Hellbent on an unprecedented 6-0 whitewash of the season, the Australians are not about to back off in the wake of yesterday's 285-run trouncing of the Indians.

Captain Steve Waugh said he believed the Indians would go into the second Test ``scarred" from the way they finished the first, capitulating for only 110 in the final innings to give Australia its fifth consecutive Test match win.

Lee, 24, the white-hot paceman from Wollongong who was 12th man in the Perth Test against Pakistan, will surely be part of that mission. ``I think that's in the plans, yes," said Waugh. ``I think he'll come into calculations for Melbourne, where it's a bit bouncier and consistently paced and in recent years it's been a pretty good place for the quicks to bowl. He'd be a very good chance of being picked."

Several if not all the Indians appear to be suspect against the bouncing ball, and the fact that Lee skittled them in the Prime Minister's XI match in Canberra, as well as troubling them in a tour match for New South Wales, will weigh on the selectors' minds. So will the fact that the Indians privately questioned the legality of Lee's bowling action.

Queenslander Michael Kasprowicz, who did not take a wicket in the first Test, is likely to make way for Lee. Mark Waugh probably will stay, despite his five straight failures, although another couple of low scores for NSW in the four-day match in Perth from Friday might change the equation further. The team's gathering momentum means the selectors are more likely to fine tune than revolutionise.

Beaten 1-0 in a rain-marred series in Sri Lanka in September, Australia has hit back with the defeat of Zimbabwe in Harare in October, a 3-0 victory over Pakistan and now another triumph in Adelaide. It is the only Australian team since 1967-68 to have won five consecutive matches, and only seven have ever done it previously.

The Australians remain on track for the season whitewash that Waugh has targeted, and the captain regards the current team as being better at recovering from difficult situations than any side in which he has played. Just as it was in the Pakistan series, Australia was struggling at one point of the Adelaide Test, at 4/52 on the first morning.

``We're very confident but we're disciplined at the moment," said Waugh. ``You saw the way we came out this morning. We could have easily relaxed and become complacent, but we went for the throat, which we've talked about, and we were really tough out there. That's got to be our goal, is to not get carried away.

``With our side at the moment, I really feel that we never think we're in trouble. We realise in a game situation that we've got to improve, but we don't panic and feel that we have to get out of situation. That comes from confidence and faith in your fellow players. Even at 4/50 (on Friday) I just had a good feeling we were going to get a big score."

The Indians refused to blame the two controversial decisions by umpire Daryl Harper for their defeat, an admirable show of restraint given they may well have cost the world's best batsman, Sachin Tendulkar, his wicket in each innings. ``It's history now," said Tendulkar.

The pathetic resistance offered yesterday, when the last five wickets fell for 34 runs in less than an hour of cricket and one dynamic spell from Damien Fleming (5/30), left India little room to find excuses. ``When the batsmen don't get runs, you're basically down and out," said coach Kapil Dev.

India travels to Hobart today for a four-day tour match against Tasmania beginning at Bellerive Oval on Friday. Tendulkar said most of the younger players in the squad would be blooded in the game.

The Indians face a monumental task to get off the floor in Melbourne, especially given the manner of their defeat in Adelaide. Waugh said he expected a shuffle of the Indian batting order in Melbourne, with Tendulkar moving up the order. But he pointed out that changes to India's team would be regarded as a sign of panic by his players.

``The lasting impression from today is that we were really clinical and professional. I think they'll take a few scars into the next Test match through that," he said.