Australia captain Pat Cummins has announced his side's playing XI for the ICC World Test Championship (WTC) final against South Africa, which is scheduled to start from June 11 at iconic Lord's Cricket Stadium in England.
While having a chat with the media in London on Tuesday and announced the XI the reigning World Test Championship winners will use is exactly the one as predicted by Australian great Ricky Ponting on The ICC Review last month.
Former No.1 ranked Test batter Marnus Labuschagne will open alongside Usman Khawaja and Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) star Josh Hazlewood won the race against Scott Boland to partner left-armer Mitchell Starc and Cummins in the pace attack.
Apart from Hazlewood, star all-rounder Cameron Green will play his first Test since back surgery, while Beau Webster retains his spot in the XI and will provide the bowlers some support with his medium pace and spin options.Earlier, Proteas captain Temba Bavuma also announced their playing XI for the one-off Test, this will be the first time that South Africa will feature in the WTC final.
Australia XI: 1. Usman Khawaja, 2. Marnus Labuschagne, 3. Cameron Green, 4. Steve Smith, 5. Travis Head, 6. Beau Webster, 7. Alex Carey (wk), 8. Pat Cummins (c), 9. Mitchell Starc, 10. Nathan Lyon, 11. Josh Hazlewood.
South Africa playing XI: Temba Bavuma (c), Aiden Markram, Ryan Rickelton, Wiaan Mulder, Tristan Stubbs, David Bedingham, Kyle Verrynne, Marco Jansen, Keshav Maharaj, Kagiso Rabada, Lungi Ngidi.