Chance to be No. 1 a driving force for Australia, says Michael Hussey

Veteran Australian batsman Michael Hussey has set sights on the imminent South Africa challenge, saying that the chance to regain first position on the ICC Test ranking will work as a driving force for his team.

By beating England by 2-0, South Africa captured the No. 1 place early in the year. The Proteas also beat the Aussies in the home series, and it is a huge opportunity for Australia to take revenge.

If Australia beat South Africa, they will be able to regain top place on the rankings, and Hussey believes this will drive his side during the upcoming event. He said ahead of the four-match Test series:

“We’re going to have to play some outstanding cricket, we’re going to have to be at our best for the whole Test series but I’m confident we can do it,” Hussey told the Cricket Australia website.

“We have a nice blend of youth and experience in our team and we’ve got a lot of hunger to make sure we get back to the number one team in the world.”

The left-hander, though, is wary of the big threat. He admitted that South Africa have a dangerous bowling attack, and Australia need to be on top of the game in order to produce good results. South Africa’s bowling attack includes the likes of Dale Steyn
and Morne Morkel.

“They’re pretty good, there’s no coincidence they are the number one team in the world with the attack they’ve got. They complement each other really well, they are all very different bowlers,” Hussey said referring to Steyn, Morkel and Vernon Philander.

“They generally play in conditions that sort of suit them as well but they’ve been able to adapt to different conditions around the world like playing in the subcontinent. I’m expecting them to adapt pretty well to Australian conditions and give us a really
good challenge.”

Meanwhile, he uttered that the bounce and pace in the Gabba Test will assist the Aussies, and it had been one of his team’s favourite venues. He added, “I think the conditions are going to be similar to what we always expect at the Gabba, it’s probably going
to do a little bit on the first day and it’ll have good pace and bounce.”

“Our guys particularly like batting at the Gabba. It can be really challenging in the first 15 minutes but once you get through that, it’s a very true pitch and you get a nice feel off the bat and can score very quickly and play all your shots.”

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Posted by Rana Nasir Ghafoor on Nov 7 2012. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry