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The Ashes may offer a reason to cheer, but this series will also witness the Australian team host a greater number of birthdays than Timezone in the nineties. Recent addition Jake Weatherald celebrated his thirty-first birthday a day prior to the team was announced. Nathan Lyon celebrates 38 the day preceding the Perth Test. Beau Webster turns 32 just before Brisbane, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on the second day in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood turns 35 on the fifth day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 by the time January is over.

Older Squad Interest Grows

For a couple of years there has been mounting fascination with the average age of this team and particularly the bowling attack. It is unusual to have almost every player in a Test side being above thirty, except for novelty-sized mascot Cameron Green and custody-weekend visitor Sam Konstas. But it didn’t logically follow that greater age was a disadvantage: a Test squad featuring a four-bowler lineup with 1,568 wickets between them is scarcely a disadvantage, and it makes sense that all of those bowlers are deep into their professional lives.

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Perhaps what really highlighted the discussion is that the backup bowlers over that period, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also well into their thirties. Younger bowlers have floated into squads – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before disappearing for years with injury, meaning there has been no clear line of succession.

Transition Forced by Injuries

So far, that hasn’t mattered, as the Big Four plus Boland have kept on backing up. Any team knows that having a group of same-generation players might mean a batch of simultaneous departures, but so far change has remained theoretical: a process that would certainly be arriving the mountain when she comes, but one that had not steamed into view.

Now, abruptly, change is here, imposed on this Australian squad in the span of a short period. The back injury to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would probably only miss the opening match, was the Cricket Australia assessment, 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 injury, the balance undergoes a far greater change with two key bowlers missing rather than one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two accurate right-arm bowlers give the stability and precision that enables Starc’s left-arm pace and swing to be used more as a weapon of attack. Missing both of them means a major adjustment in the composition of the team. Boland handling the new ball is not unusual in his first-class career, but he has been so successful in Test matches entering the attack after seven or eight overs of early pressure. Now he’ll probably have to be the man up front.

Debutant Faces Expectations

Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at thirty-one years of age himself isn't an intimidated youngster, but he might become an overawed 31-year-old. A full stadium crowd, half of it English, for the first Test of a eagerly awaited Ashes series will not make for an easy debut, no matter how many media stories describe him as laid-back. He could be brought onto the field on a sun lounger and still be anxious.

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It's uncertain, it might all go swimmingly for this revamped bowling lineup. It might not. What is striking is how quickly Australia have transitioned from the surety of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the unknown of Starc, Lyon, mumble mumble. It's unclear what new injuries the opening match may cause. It's unknown whether Cummins will be good to go for Brisbane, and good to back up after that match, given how tricky stress fractures can be. Who knows how long Hazlewood might be sidelined, with a track record of getting injured early in series and a history of minor injuries becoming extended absences.

Future Unclear

The latter part of the contest may see the primary four bowlers back together and all going well. Or it might see transition beginning much sooner than the stretch goal of 2027 in England. Not through Neser, who is apparently next in line and could be a great pink-ball Brisbane option, but beyond that with options uncertain. Sean Abbott was in the original team, though he’s now also injured and has never played a Test. Richardson has just had his injury-prone arm put back on, and this level is no place for gradually starting one’s work. After them lies the true uncertainty, and amid it all opportunity for the opposing side. You can hear that change a-coming, rolling round the bend, and the English team hasn't seen the sunshine since they can't recall when.