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Australia's legendary spinner, Nathan Lyon, who will be turning 38 years old later this week addressed concerns over transition of current Test squad pointed out by legendary captain Steve Waugh. The former captain had said that the current chief selector George Bailey is reluctant to make tough calls. Waugh had said how Australian team will have a big hole to fill when the quartet of Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Lyon decide to retire.
“The game is a lot more professional than what it was even 10 years ago when I started. The science behind it all, the recovery, the way that players and the athletes look after themselves and the work they do outside hours to make sure they’re putting hours in to get their bodies right (have all improved),” Lyon was quoted as saying by Fox Sports a couple of weeks ahead of Ashes opener at Perth Stadium.
“I feel like age is just a number. I feel like I’m still yet to play my best cricket.”
Lyon has no thoughts about retirement
Lyon is currently not thinking about retirement. he said that the quartet hasn't sat down and talked about their respective retirements as they want to continue representing Australia.
“As soon as you start talking about retirement, it’s going to come around a lot quicker,” Lyon said.
“I haven’t thought about retirement or spoken about retirement, and I know ‘Starcy’ hasn’t done that, and I know that Josh and Pat (haven’t either).
“Between the four of us, we haven’t sat down and said ‘this is what we’re going to do’. We love playing cricket with each other, we love playing cricket for Australia, we love playing our role and we love winning Test matches, so we’ll continue to do that for a while.”
Lyon recalls ‘hard conversation’ when he was rested for pink-ball Test
Lyon also talked about how he had a tough conversation with skipper Cummins, head coach Andrew McDonald and administrator Tony Dodemaide about him sitting out of the pink-ball Test against West Indies which was also Starc’s 100th Test appearance. He disagreed over former Australian team mentor Waugh saying that there are no hard conversations between selectors and the players.
“I had a really hard conversation with Tony Dodemaide, Andrew McDonald and Pat regarding that last Test match, so I don’t necessarily agree with that,” he said.
“I feel like the selectors at the moment within the current set-up have been really clear with their messages and they’re willing to make hard calls. I was the one who received that hard conversation, so I know what it feels like.
“I feel like our relationship and communication with the coaches and selectors and the players is really strong, and that’s incredibly important,” he remarked.
Lyon set to surpass Ashwin, Muralitharan
Lyon has 110 wickets from 30 Tests against England, including two fifers. Currently, the record for most wickets in Tests against England belongs to Shane Warne (195) which is unlikely to be broken. However, Lyon can take the third place behind Hugh Trumble (141 wickets) by surpassing Ravichandran Ashwin (114 wickets) and Muttiah Muralitharan (112 wickets).
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