Australian fast bowling great Brett Lee has thrown his support behind Scott Boland to play the opening Ashes Test.
Cricket’s most famous series gets underway on Friday night when the Aussies take on England at Edgbaston.
While the tourists’ batting order is essentially set in stone, there remains a query over the bowling attack.
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Boland took five wickets as the Aussies thrashed India to win the World Test Championship final at The Oval. His bag included the scalps of Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, and Ravindra Jadeja in the second innings, and his figures were bettered only by off-spinner Nathan Lyon who took four.
But Boland, 34, has essentially been holding the place of fellow right-armer Josh Hazlewood, whose dodgy Achilles only added to a horror run of injuries over the past two years.
Hazlewood is now fit and available for selection ahead of the Ashes, but his inclusion would need to come at the cost of either Boland or left-arm swingman Mitchell Starc.
In eight Test matches since making his debut in Melbourne two summers ago, Boland averages a ridiculous 14.57. Hazlewood’s is an impressive 25.83 from his 59 matches in the baggy green.
Hazlewood can be considered an Aussie bowling great in his own right, but Lee – who helped Australia to its last Ashes win in England in 2001 – believes he will be left out for the first match.
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“It’s a conundrum, isn’t it?” Lee told Nine’s Today.
“I’m a massive Hazlewood fan, and also Mitchell Starc. What the team has done so well is they’ve put themselves into a position where you’ve got to leave one guy out, which is going to be heartache for whichever bowler it is.
“I think you go Scott Boland. You can’t overlook Scott Boland in those conditions.
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“Hazlewood was under a bit of an injury cloud with his Achilles. The way Scott Boland has bowled in Australia, but also in these (English) conditions, it suits him down to a tee, so I’d be going with Scott Boland.”
Australia has not won an Ashes series overseas since 2001, when Lee featured in an attack alongside Glenn McGrath, Jason Gillespie, and Shane Warne.
The current Aussie bowling cartel of Pat Cummins, Lyon, Starc, Hazlewood, and now Boland are considered one of the best bowling groups ever, but they are yet to win in either England or India.
Lee believes Australia can win this series, but says the first match will be crucial.
“Edgbaston is the key for me,” he said.
“There’s a lot of pressure on the Poms as well, because when you think about this whole Bazball thing they have been playing, if they lose the first Test the English press will be pretty hard on England.
“For Australia, they’ve got to start well.”
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