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The Ashes could provide one cause for celebration, but this contest will also see the Aussie side celebrate a greater number of birthdays than Timezone in the nineties. New boy Jake Weatherald had his 31st a day before the squad was announced. Nathan Lyon turns 38 the day before the Test in Perth. Beau Webster reaches 32 just ahead of the Brisbane match, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on the second day in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood turns 35 on the final day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 before January is over.

Ageing Squad Interest Builds

For two or three years there has been growing curiosity with the age of this team and particularly the bowling attack. It is unusual to have nearly all player near a Test team being over 30, aside from novelty-sized mascot Cameron Green and custody-weekend visitor Sam Konstas. But it didn’t logically follow that greater age was a problem: a Test team boasting a four-bowler lineup with 1,568 wickets between them is scarcely a disadvantage, and it stands to reason that all of those bowlers are well into their careers.

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Perhaps what really highlighted the talking point is that the reserve players over that period, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also well into their 30s. Younger bowlers have briefly joined squads – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before disappearing for years with injury, meaning there has been no obvious replacement plan.

Change Forced by Injuries

So far, that hasn’t mattered, as the core four plus Boland have kept on performing. Any side knows that having a batch of similarly-aged players might mean a group of similarly-timed retirements, but so far change has remained hypothetical: a train that would indeed be coming round the mountain when she comes, but one that hadn’t yet steamed into view.

Now, abruptly, change is here, imposed on this Australian squad in the space of a short period. The back injury to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would probably only miss the opening match, was the team management view, and as the first-change bowler behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could easily be covered for by Boland.

But now that Hazlewood has gone down with a hamstring strain, the team balance experiences a much more significant shift with two players absent rather than a single one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two tight-line right-armers give the balance and control that allows 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 handling the new ball is nothing new in his domestic career, but he has been so effective in Tests coming on after seven or eight overs of early pressure. Now he’ll probably have to be the opening bowler.

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 first Test of a deliriously anticipated Ashes series will not make for an simple first match, no matter how many newspaper profiles describe him as laid-back. He could be wheeled onto the field on a banana lounge and still be anxious.

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It's uncertain, it might all go swimmingly for this new attack. It might not. What is striking is how rapidly Australia have transitioned from the certainty of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the unknown of Starc, Lyon, and others. Who knows what further injuries the opening match may cause. Who knows whether Cummins will be fit for Brisbane, and able to continue after that match, given how tricky stress fractures can be. It's uncertain how long Hazlewood might be sidelined, with a history of getting injured early in series and a pattern of minor injuries turning into longer layoffs.

Future Uncertain

The back half of the series may see the primary four bowlers reunited and all performing well. Or it might experience transition setting in much earlier than the stretch goal of 2027 in the UK. Not through Neser, who is apparently the next option and could be a excellent day-night Brisbane option, but beyond that with options uncertain. Sean Abbott was in the initial squad, though he’s now also hurt and has never played a Test. Richardson has just had his crash-test-dummy arm repaired, and this format is no place for gradually starting one’s work. After them lies the true uncertainty, and throughout it opportunity for the visiting team. You can sense that change a-coming, rolling round the corner, and the English team ain’t seen the success since they can't recall when.