The series might already be decided after the amazing final day in Melbourne but Australia and Pakistan have one more assignment to fill with the red ball and they will do that in Sydney on Tuesday when the two sides meet in the New Year Test match.
Australia took a commanding 2-0 lead in the series when they won at the MCG and a win here will complete a series whitewash. Pakistan are a proud side though and they will want a consolation.
Australia
You would be hard pushed to say Australia bowled well at Melbourne but then you would have to counter that by saying they were playing on an absolute road of a pitch. They will need to bowl much better here if they are to be more convincing in their performance but they will know that and I expect that to happen.
One area where the Aussies can be pleased is with the bat where they have looked good in both matches. That was a real area of concern during the South Africa series so that is important. They have a lot of new players in that part of their line up so they will take plenty of encouragement from their batting performance.
Pakistan
Nobody will need telling just how hard to take the defeat in Melbourne will have been. Misbah was already considering retirement and defeats like that make that decision a stronger possibility but he is carrying on for this match which is good to see. How Pakistan use that disappoint will be interesting to see.
Bowling has been the issue for Pakistan in this series and nobody thought we would be saying that before a ball was bowled. They haven’t been able to get down to Australia’s tail regularly enough or early enough although the pitches have favoured the batsmen. This one won’t do that so that might bring them into play a bit more.
Team News
Australia have already named their side for this match and they have made two changes. Hilton Cartwright is coming in for Nic Maddinson while Stephen O’Keefe is in for Jackson Bird.
Pakistan look likely to change things in their bowling attack. Conditions might suit a second spinner but the talk is that Rahat Ali will come in for Sohail Khan.
Sydney Cricket Ground
This will be the 105th time there has been Test cricket on this ground. Australia have a 57-28 winning record here with 19 draws while Pakistan have two wins and four defeats with a single draw from their seven matches.
The wicket has been turning square at times this season and we’ve already seen it spin nicely in the Big Bash so the spinners will be in play here. The batsmen may need to go big in the first innings as batting in the second innings will be tough.
Betting
We’ve had a lot of dead rubbers in international cricket recently and as I repeatedly say I’m not a massive fan of betting on them and I’m just going to go with a small bet here more because of the price rather than anything.
These are the conditions that Pakistan should function the best in. Yasir Shah will be in play throughout and if we think back to England earlier in the summer Pakistan won on the two dry tracks which took spin.
They have been batting much better recently so if Shah does take the game on and deliver the goods against an Australia side whose struggles against top class spin is well known then the tourists are huge value to deliver a consolation win.
Tips
Back Pakistan to beat Australia for a 2/10 stake at 7.00 with Ladbrokes
Back them here:
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2017
