AUS announce playing XI for 2nd SL Test

Australia have announced the playing XI for the second Test against Sri Lanka. Skipper Tim Paine declared the team and as expected the hosts have decided to continue with the winning combination and have made no changes in the playing XI.

Happy with our combination: Paine

The Aussie skipper stated in the press conference that they are unchanged which is nice. He noted that coming off a good win they are happy with their combination.

According to Paine, this pitch is probably slightly different, they just think that they will be able to get more overs out of Marnus (Labuschagne) on a pitch like this.

JUST IN: Australia name an unchanged XI for Canberra Test against Sri Lanka. #AUSvSL MORE: https://t.co/7rFJRW2uP3

— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) January 31, 2019

Paine backs Mitchell Starc

At the same time, the Aussie wicket-keeper backed under performing pacer Mitchell Starc. He said that they are still reasonably happy with his output. He agreed that Starc is not 100 per cent at his best but he thinks that’s a sign of how good a bowler he is that he’s still finding ways to pick up wickets at certain times.

He noted that when he gets it right he’s going to be devastating and hopefully it will be this Test straight up tomorrow morning or potentially some reverse swing when he is devastating. Hopefully there’s a chance of that happening here.

Australia lead the series 1-0

The hosts outplayed Sri Lanka in the first Test and currently lead the series 1-0. Australia thrashed Sri Lanka by one innings and 40 runs. The visitors will be particularly unhappy with their efforts with the bat as in both innings they failed to score more than 150 runs.

Australia on the other hand finally had something to cheer about their batting as the middle-order flourished in the first Test.

Australia playing XI for second Test vs Sri Lanka:

Marcus Harris, Joe Burns, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Travis Head, Kurtis Patterson, Tim Paine (c & wk), Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Jhye Richardson, Nathan Lyon