Former Australian captain Tim Paine reckoned that behind Travis Head’s shift as a Test batter and his resurgence as the enforcer while doing it consistently is Justin Langer’s removal as the head coach of the national men’s team. Paine, who worked with Langer and Head as captain-coach and captain-player extensively hoped that both will not mind him saying it that they had different school of thoughts as far as Test cricket was concerned and that the former’s departure unshackled the left-hander like anything.
“I don’t think either of them will mind me saying this, but I think he and JL used to have a real difference of opinion,” Paine told SEN.
“They were trying really hard for him to work on his defence and it wasn’t the way he wanted to go about it, but he was a young Test player who was trying to impress and trying to stay in the team, so he was trying to please a bit of everyone,” Paine said, referring to Langer making Head play in the traditional manner and the batter too played that way.
“I think that’s been the major shift in his output because he is sticking true to the way he wants to play.
“At times he’s going to fail and at times he’s gonna have lean patches, but he’s going to be super aggressive, he’s going to play his shots and he’s going to try and be a match winner and we’re just seeing him blossom at the moment in all formats of the game,” Paine added. Head averaged 43.20 in Tests till December 2021 and since the start of 2022, his average has been 43.73, so not much of a change there.
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However, the difference is revealed in the strike rate. Head, who used to play at 66.16, is striking at 78.9 in 29 games he has played since 2022. There has been an evident shift in Head’s strike rate and since he bats at No 5, he fits into the batting puzzle like a hand in glove coming in after Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne.
In the last 18 months, Head’s rise as destroyer across all three formats has been evident, especially against India as their nemesis now has a century in the WTC final, World Cup 2023 and now in Adelaide Oval in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. Head will hope to continue his form as he already has an 89 and a 140 in the two matches and make Australia forget the previous all tours.
