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The historic Ashes series could provide one cause for celebration, but this contest will also see 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 before the team was announced. Nathan Lyon celebrates 38 the day before the Test in Perth. Beau Webster reaches 32 just ahead of the Brisbane match, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on day two in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood becomes 35 on the final day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 by the time January is over.

Ageing Squad Fascination Grows

For two or three years there has been mounting fascination with the age of this side and particularly the bowling unit. It is rare to have almost every player in a Test side being above thirty, aside from young mascot Cameron Green and occasional visitor Sam Konstas. But it wasn't necessarily true that older age was a problem: a Test team featuring a four-bowler lineup with 1,568 wickets between them is scarcely a weakness, and it stands to reason that all of those bowlers are well into their careers.

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Perhaps what really highlighted the talking point is that the backup bowlers over that time, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also well into their thirties. Younger bowlers have briefly joined teams – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before vanishing for years with injury, meaning there has been no clear line of succession.

Change Forced by Setbacks

So far, that hasn't been an issue, as the core four plus Boland have kept on backing up. Any side knows that having a group of similarly-aged players might mean a batch of similarly-timed departures, but so far change has remained hypothetical: a train that would indeed be coming round the mountain when she comes, but one that hadn’t yet become visible.

Now, abruptly, change is upon them, forced upon this Australian squad in the span of a few weeks. The spinal issue to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would likely only miss the opening match, was the team management assessment, and as the first-change bowler behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could comfortably be replaced by Boland.

But now that Hazlewood has been sidelined with a hamstring injury, the balance undergoes a much more significant change with two players absent rather than a single one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two accurate right-arm bowlers give the balance and control that allows Starc’s left-arm speed and movement to be used more as a attacking option. Losing both of them means a fundamental shift in the balance of the team. Boland taking the new ball is not unusual in his first-class career, but he has been so effective in Tests coming on after seven to eight overs of early pressure. Now he’ll likely have to be the man up front.

Debutant Confronts Pressure

Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at thirty-one years of age himself isn't an overawed youth, but he might become an nervous thirty-one-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 relaxed. He could be brought onto the ground on a sun lounger and still be nervous.

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Who knows, it might all go smoothly for this revamped bowling lineup. It might not work out. What is notable is how quickly Australia have moved from the certainty of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the unknown of Starc, Lyon, mumble mumble. Who knows what further injuries the opening match may bring. It's unknown whether Cummins will be fit for the Brisbane Test, and able to continue after Brisbane, given how complicated stress injuries can be. It's uncertain how long Hazlewood might be sidelined, with a history of getting injured early in series and a pattern of initially small injuries becoming extended absences.

Outlook Uncertain

The back half of the contest may witness the main four bowlers back together and all performing well. Or it might see transition setting in much sooner than the stretch goal of 2027 in the UK. Not through Neser, who is apparently next in line and could be a excellent pink-ball Brisbane choice, but beyond that with choices uncertain. Sean Abbott was in the original team, though he’s now also injured and has never played a Test match. Richardson has just had his injury-prone arm put back on, and this format is no place for easing into one’s work. Beyond them lies the true uncertainty, and amid it all opportunity for the opposing side. You can sense that train a-coming, coming around the corner, and England ain’t seen the success since they can't recall when.