October 28 Monday 2002
Australia should experiment in Ashes: Healy

BRISBANE: Former Australia wicketkeeper Ian Healy thinks the national selectors should blood some young talent in the Ashes series against England starting next month.

Healy's comments were part of another day of intense media debate in Australia over veteran middle-order batsman Mark Waugh's place in the side. The 37-year-old Waugh, who is struggling for form, faces an anxious wait before Australia name their team on Monday for the first Test starting in Brisbane on November 7. "What gave us such good success through the nineties was some selections in the mid-eighties where we threw some blokes in," Healy said on Australia television. "And now is a good time to throw a young fellow in while the experience and the confidence of the others around him is perfect."

Healy, 38, who claimed a world record 395 Test dismissals in 119 matches, played his last Test in October 1999 in Harare, Zimbabwe. He was dropped from the side for the first test against Pakistan in Brisbane the following month when his replacement Adam Gilchrist suffered the indignity of being booed by Queenslander Healy's home-town crowd.

Former Test captain Ian Chappell, fondly remembered in Australia for his aggressive style in the 1970s with a feared pace attack of Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thomson, said planning for the post-Waugh era would be difficult.

Chappell was pessimistic about England's chances against the top-ranked Australians after the touring side's ordinary showing in two matches against second-string state sides in Perth. "I just don't see how England can win a Test. They may save one or two in the series but I just don't see how they can win a Test against this Australian side," he said.