West Australian coach Justin Langer has no doubt a result will still be achieved over the last three days after rain washed out WA’s opening day in the crucial Sheffield Shield match with Queensland.

Both WA and Queensland need to win the match outright to be a chance of making the Shield final and then hope that Victoria and South Australia lose to Tasmania and NSW respectively, but that will now have to be achieved inside three days.

However, the WACA pitch has produced results throughout the season well short of the four-day mark so Langer has no doubt that an outright result for either side in Perth will be achieved.

“The history of the WACA this year suggests that there will still be a result. I think we’ve only lost 48 overs from the game because we can make up the three hours, so we’ve just lost three hours. It’s obviously disappointing, but there’s nothing we can do about the rain,” Langer said.

“(The other results are only in our favour) if we win outright. There are obviously some considerations, but if South Australia and Victoria win outright then it’s going to make our job a bit harder, but it comes down to us winning outright really.”

Meanwhile, the former star Test batsman who was most recently Australia’s batting coach before taking up the role with WA, was left surprised with the happenings in India this week.

“I was surprised that it got to that point and it’s a shame that it got to a point where four players were left unavailable for selection,” Langer said.

“The best thing as a general rule is that if people step out of line then you deal with the problem right at the time. That’s my style of doing things. If people step out of line, you point out when they’ve done something really well or when they haven’t done something well.

“Eventually that is learned behaviour. It’s a shame it’s got to the point it has where they had to do something so drastic as suspend four players. I’d hope I wouldn’t let it get to that point.”