Former Australian captain Kim Hughes expressed his disappointment with Australia’s performance in the ongoing Test series against Sri Lanka and said it was one of the worst ever performances he has ever witnessed from an Australian side.
Hughes was the captain of Australia when they were humiliated in 5 consecutive Tests against the mighty West Indies in the mid-1980s that forced him to resign from captaincy. He had seen some real bad days in Australian cricket during his captaincy from 1979-84 where Australia managed to win only 4 out of the 28 games and found it very difficult to recapture their previous dominance.
Hughes who is far off from the Australian setup nowadays found it hard to fathom out what was going on in the Island nation and what was the reason behind Australia’s listless performance.
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Hughes who played 70 Tests for Australia said that the tour to Sri Lanka had been a “calamity” so far.
"This is absolutely one of the worst performances I've seen from an Australian team," Hughes said. "Cricket Australia has done everything like simulate subcontinent conditions at the centre of excellence (in Brisbane) and has hired specialist coaches like Murali (Muttiah Muralitharan) but nothing has changed on the field.
"You would think with all this expertise and preparation that Australia would have improved (in the subcontinent) but they have gone backwards," Hughes lamented.
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Prior to this series Steven Smith and David Warner had said that patience would be the key to Australia’s success but they were unable to execute their plans well. Most of the batsmen were dismissed playing rash strokes on pitches that were hardly rank turners.
Hughes labelled Australia’s batting as "very disappointing". "Test cricket is a test of mentality and technique and Australia's batsmen were found wanting," he said. "The batsmen haven't been able to grind it out as it is a waiting game batting in the subcontinent. You have got to pick off the spinners."
It is likely that Shaun Marsh might be recalled to the side as he remains the only batsman with a Test century in Sri Lanka so it will be interesting to see which batsman gets dropped for the upcoming Test.
Hughes felt Usman Khawaja looked out of sorts and should start scoring runs in all conditions.
"Khawaja needs to lift," Hughes said. "The jury is well and truly out. He can't just perform in conditions that suit, he needs to contribute when the going gets tough."
Australia must win the last Test in Colombo to keep their numero uno status in Test cricket intact, proving the results in India-West Indies and England-Pakistan series also go their way.
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