Australia’s Twenty20 captain George Bailey wants his charges to show they’re worthy of a spot in this year’s World Cup with a strong showing this week against India.
Bailey, who’ll be making his debut for Australia in any form of the game in Wednesday’s T20 match at ANZ Stadium, and his team-mates have only got a week together with the second and final match of the series being played in Melbourne on Friday.
But the Tasmanian says a good showing by the 14 players chosen to take on the Indians could go a long way to booking them a spot on the plane to Sri Lanka for the T20 World Cup in September.
“What we’re trying to do at the moment is galvanise this group and let this group know that there’s a World Cup in six months and we’re the 14 that have got first crack at proving we should be there,” Bailey said on Tuesday.
“That’s one reason to keep that team aspect of it together … we know that while we’re only together for a week, there’s something pretty special down the road.”
Bailey’s selection as captain in place of dumped Cameron White raised eyebrows last week, particularly with the 29-year-old having a modest Big Bash League campaign for the Melbourne Stars.
But Bailey feels he’s more than ready to make the step up to international cricket and is comfortable stepping straight into a leadership role after three years at the helm for his state.
“I’m here as captain, it’s my team and I’m trying to do things the way I like to do them,” Bailey said.
“The beauty is I get along very well with Mickey (Arthur, coach), I think we have a very similar outlook on things so we’ve worked really well together in the first couple of days.
“The captaining side of things, I’m quite comfortable about that, it’s more about getting to know the players as well as I can as quickly as I can.”
Bailey said the immediate challenge for his group ahead of Wednesday night’s clash with the Indians would be maintaining the good form of the Test team after a 4-0 series whitewash.
“We’ve spoken about that. The great energy they’ve provided and the great feeling amongst that group,” he said.
“Consistency is a really important word for Twenty20. That’s the hardest thing to be as a Twenty20 team.
“The one thing I’m really excited about, the group that we’ve got here this week is full of match-winners but they’re pretty consistent match-winners.”
Bailey’s international debut will also pit him against Chennai Super Kings team-mate MS Dhoni.
The Indian captain said Bailey’s character would serve him well at international level.
But if Dhoni is expecting any favours from his Indian Premier League team-mate he could be waiting a while according to Bailey.
“I’m looking forward to catching up and saying `g’day’ to him but hopefully that’s after the game and he’s saying `well done Bails, well played’,” Bailey said.
Wednesday’s match begins at 7.35pm AEDT.
Squads:
Australia: George Bailey (capt), David Warner, Travis Birt, Dan Christian, Xavier Doherty, James Faulkner, Aaron Finch, Brad Hogg, David Hussey, Brett Lee, Mitchell Marsh, Shaun Marsh, Clint McKay, Matthew Wade.
India: MS Dhoni (capt), Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Sachin Tendulkar, Suresh Raina, Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Ravindra Jadeja, Manoj Tiwary, Parthiv Patel, Zaheer Khan, Umesh Yadav, Irfan Pathan, Vinay Kumar, Praveen Kumar, Rahul Sharma, Ravichandran Ashwin.
