Contenders for the next Border-Gavaskar Trophy tour, only four months away, will head to India later this month
Peter Handscomb’s Test comeback hopes are alive after the veteran batter was named as the oldest and most experienced player on an Australia A tour of India.
Ashes-winning pacemen Brendan Doggett and Jhye Richardson also add considerable firepower to the 15-man squad picked for the four-day component of the ‘A’ trip to Puducherry on India’s east coast. Fellow quicks Mahli Beardman and Spencer Johnson headline the squad picked for three ensuing 50-over games.
Australia A four-day squad: Brendan Doggett, Jack Edwards, Peter Handscomb, Sam Harper, Liam Hatcher, Campbell Kellaway, Sam Konstas, Nathan McSweeney, Todd Murphy, Fergus O’Neill, Josh Philippe, Jhye Richardson, Corey Rocchiccioli, Jason Sangha, Liam Scott
Australia A one-day squad: Mahli Beardman, Nikhil Chaudhary, Ben Dwarshuis, Jack Edwards, Aaron Hardie, Spencer Johnson, Sam Konstas, Nathan McSweeney, Todd Murphy, Mitch Owen, Josh Philippe, Tanveer Sangha, Liam Scott, Lachlan Shaw
Handscomb has not featured in international cricket (nor for Australia A) since playing all four Tests on Australia’s last Border-Gavaskar Trophy tour in 2023. The right-hander has been eager to dispel his ‘spin specialist’ tag, but the 35-year-old’s best route back to the Baggy Green is likely to come when Australia return to India in four months’ time.
Doggett and Richardson will likewise be strong contenders for that five-Test trip beginning in January given their elevated ball speed. Off-spinner Todd Murphy is another likely starter there along with Matthew Kuhnemann, the left-arm spinner who has not been picked in the ‘A’ squad nor for the overlapping ODI tour of southern Africa.
“We consider these tours an important part of performance and developing game styles in subcontinent conditions as part of our continued investment into the Australia A program,” selection boss George Bailey said.
“It’s a strong representation of players who will be in contention to be part of the group we take to India next year or see as having potential for further opportunities into the future.”
Richardson made an encouraging return from several major shoulder surgeries during last summer’s Boxing Day Test and has since played seven more first-class matches; three for Western Australia and a further four for Yorkshire, the latter stint yielding him only six wickets at 66.
Fellow Western Australian quick Beardman will continue his carefully-managed recovery from back stress issues. He is still yet to make his first-class debut but is rated one of the better Australian pace prospects of recent times and has performed strongly in white-ball cricket. He took two wickets on T20I debut against Pakistan in Lahore in March.
It is otherwise an unusually settled Australia A group; nine of those who featured in last year’s Australia A four-day matches in Lucknow are returning, the Test-capped Nathan McSweeney, Sam Konstas and Murphy among them.
With Ollie Peake and Cooper Connolly named in Australia’s ODI squad, Jason Sangha joins the A squad while wicketkeeper Sam Harper has been rewarded for a breakout domestic season and is in line to play his first Australia A games.
Kurtis Patterson is the most notable absentee from the A squad among leading domestic batters who have featured at that level in recent times. The two-Test left-hander captained the Cricket Australia XI against Bangladesh, scoring a half-century.
Johnson will join the one-day squad after the ODIs in Zimbabwe and South Africa. Aussie capped white-ball players Nikhil Chaudhary, Ben Dwarshuis, Aaron Hardie, Mitch Owen and Tanveer Sangha are also in the 50-over squad. McSweeney, Philippe, Murphy, Konstas, Liam Scott and Jack Edwards are the players in both A squads.
Australia A men’s tour of India 2026
September 22-25: First four-day match, Puducherry
September 29-October 2: Second four-day match, Puducherry
October 6: First one-day match, Puducherry
October 9: Second one-day match, Puducherry
October 11: Third one-day match, Puducherry
