Legends call for ‘freak’ Maxwell’s Test recall
There’s calls for Australia for consider a Test recall for Glenn Maxwell after the dynamic big-hitter stunned the Big Bash League last night.
While Twenty20 and Test cricket are two different things, Maxwell’s record 154 off 64 balls for the Melbourne Renegades has tongues wagging around the game.
The lairy right-hander – who often switches to a left-hand stance to bamboozle opposition bowlers – has been somewhat pigeon-holed as a white-ball cricketer.
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His seven Tests have been a mixed bag of success and he hasn’t worn the baggy green since September 2017. Only a couple of months ago he all but conceded his Test career was over.
He’s scored one century but averages a measly 26.07 in the Test team and his part-time spin bowling is not good enough to warrant his selection in the country’s most prestigious outfit.
But one-time Test bowler Bryce McGain believes Australian selectors should give Maxwell another chance.
“His move to the top order (in the BBL) has been fantastic, he’s just played with complete freedom knowing he’s got a full line-up below him,” McGain told SEN radio.
“There were shots in all directions. It was only later in his innings that he brought out the reverse paddle and sweep, and started launching those (into the stands).
“Once he’s in one of those moods he’s just about unstoppable, and he just kept going, there was no cameo.
“It was unbelievable, clean hitting, best-in-the world stuff.”
Australia has a trip to Pakistan coming up, if the tour is given the go-ahead before March.
Maxwell would be suited to the dry Asian decks, according to McGain.
“He’s a very good player of spin,” McGain said.
“He’s proven that when he’s played Test cricket in India previously. He scored a hundred in the hottest conditions, the hardest environment, against the best team in their home ground.
“He does have the different gears to play… he gives you handy off-spin as well, he fields like a jet, so he can add enormous value to that Australian Test line-up.
“The other part to support it is that no other team wants to come up against him.
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“He walks to the wicket and the other team go ‘what are we going to do? We need to put in a man for a reverse sweep, we need to cover all this’.
“He’ll put tension into the opposition, and could take the game away pretty quickly if he’s batting at six or seven in an all-rounder slot with that handy spin bowling.
“It’s a good quandary to have for the selectors.”
England legend Michael Vaughan was equally impressed by Maxwell’s record innings – the highest individual total in the competition’s history, helping the Stars to the highest team total on record.
“He’s a freak,” Vaughan said of Maxwell.
“It’s as simple as that. To see that innings and the way that he’s played it, the bowling’s not been to the highest standard but he makes bowlers shiver the shots he can play, the power, the skill-levels – pure entertainer.”
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