Cricket ball

And I think we've spoken about this before, but sort of coming up from maybe the more white ball route, I think Davies starting probably more T20 cricket than moving into T20.

50 over cricket and that now being, I think, more transferable these days in the modern game to playing Red Bull.

We're not seeing as much difference in batting prowess from these batsmen, these top end batsmen from white ball heading into Red Bull.

And we're seeing it can actually prove really, really big dividends in developing a white ball game and that actually transferring into red ball.

Are you sort of finding that in this modern age batting process

Vidler's the guy I was thinking of.

They need a couple more years of development, particularly in Red Bull cricket, before they're going to be ready for test-match cricket.

So I think in the short term, replacing those guys is going to be a bit more of a challenge than the batters.

I do, yeah.

Oh, yeah, definitely.

I considered it really closely.

I've sort of got a very good relationship with Stephen Fleming, the Red Bull coach for England.

We worked together in the IPL for 15 years.

So there's a little bit of conjecture over what the teams will look like.

But it's been eight and a half years since Australia's last Red Bull tour in South Africa.

That was in 2018.

And we know what happened back then.

Yeah, absolutely.

Well said, Drewie.

So part of the reason there's probably been a little bit of conjecture, and I suppose that selectors may have felt like they needed to lean on Nick Maddison for a series like this, was Australia A's just had a tour in India, or they're finishing up their tour, but they've had their two Red Bull games, their unofficial tests.

There probably weren't as many runs with the exclusion of Sam Harper out of there to pick someone.

I think most of it's set to come in the morning, so we may be seeing another win the toss and elect a bowl in the Sheffield Shield, which we saw all too often last season.

It was almost farcical to see a team in Red Bull win the toss and elect to bowl.

But these days, bowling first seems to be the way in white ball cricket, whether that's T20 or ODI.

Now it's starting to come into fashion in the Red Bull as well.

WA's Scott, if you missed it, Aaron Hardy to lead the troops out.

Cam Bancroft, Hilton Cartwright, Brodie Couch, Joel Curtis, Kieran Elliott, Elba Esterhuizen, Sam Fanning, Jaden Goodwin, Liam Haskett, Joel Parris, Joy Richardson, and Corey Rocacholi rounds it out.

And, and he went through a massive dip and a bit of a, you know, a bit of soul sh- searching ensued.

Falling in and out of love with Red Bull cricket at times, and all the rest of it.

Sort of really gone through it.

And n- and now seems to be at a place at 27 years old where, um, not only is he very comfortable in his game, but he's also very comfortable in his own skin and, and who he is as a person and, um, what he expects of himself.

It was something that, um, the ECB became quite strong on a couple of years ago.

Richard Gould was talking about whether they'll give NOCs to players to go and play if they're on a multi-format contract to leave the English season and go and play in the PSL, for instance.

And now it's at the point where the IPL is exempt, but if you wanna go and play in the MLC and you are a Red Bull player, you're not technically allowed to.

But then Reece Topley came back and played for Surrey.

No, I've probably put my whole season aside just working on defence and working on a foundation.

And that's been with the Red Bull.

So that sort of shows where my intentions are to sell the show with the Red Bull and hopefully I get an opportunity in the Shield season coming up.

There was a couple of other good scores.

Of course, Jake Weatherill got out there and he showed that he still got it when it comes to the white ball game for sure and would have been getting a bit of frustration out, I reckon.