George Bailey breaks silence on allegations of bias after Nathan McSweeney’s Australia snub

Australia National Cricket Team chief selector George Bailey has opened up on the selection of the Test squad for the remainder of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024-25.

The statement from George Bailey has come amid the allegations of bias and favoritism on selectors over the snub of the youngster Nathan McSweeney.

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Nathan McSweeney dropped as Sam Konstas selected

The Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024-25 currently stands at 1-1 with two matches remaining. Australia batters, barring Travis Head, have not looked at their best and the poor starts have been a major concern for the Aussies.

Usman Khawaja and his new opening partner, Nathan McSweeney, failed miserably against India's pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah in all the matches. Hence, the selection committee was forced to make a bold decision.

The George Bailey-led panel dropped Nathan McSweeney after back-to-back failures and added the 19-year-old opening batter Sam Konstas to the squad.

Notably, Usman Khawaja has also looked extremely poor in the series but the axe fell on the newcomer as the veteran was retained in the squad. This has led to the selectors facing huge criticism.

Also, pacer Jhye Richardson replaced Josh Hazlewood, who is ruled out of the series, Josh Inglis remains as a spare batter in the team and Beau Webster has also retained his place.

Nathan was disappointed - George Bailey

Talking about the selection of the teenage batting sensation Sam Konstas, George Bailey stated that the batting style of the youngster is quite different from others, and they were looking to throw something different at India. George Bailey stated:

"You can say the way our top three are playing has been reasonably similar and we'd like the ability to throw something different at India off the back of that. If you look more broadly, I don't necessarily think the top six has quite functioned to the level that we need in this series as a whole.

"Think Sam's method, his style, is different to Nathan's, different again to Beau's and Josh's as the other batting options within that team and we think they provide the options of a different look and a different make up for the XI come Boxing Day."

George Bailey revealed that Nathan McSweeney is not in a good mood after his snub but made it clear that the selectors still have belief in him to succeed at the Test level for the Australia National Cricket Team.

"Nathan was disappointed and really the message to him was, much the same as at the start of the series, that we believe, and that hasn't changed, that he has the ability and temperament to succeed at Test level but just given the way the series has played out, we want the option of throwing something different at India for this next Test," George Bailey added.

In the lead-up to the series he was performing incredibly well - George Bailey on Nathan McSweeney

While defending the decision to select Nathan McSweeney for the first three Test matches, George Bailey said that the youngster was delivering good performances in domestic cricket in the lead-up to the series. He said:

"In the lead-up to the series he was performing incredibly well. Think the key around that was his methodology and the way he plays, we believe doesn't change to much wherever he's coming in in the order. It hasn't quite worked out as you'd like it do at the start, but it's still very much the start of his career."

Bailey further revealed that there were no discussions to drop Usman Khawaja despite his failures and the same condition applied to the former World No.1 batter Marnus Labuschagne. He elaborated:

"You are always looking for your senior players to be the leaders in how you play. Specifically to Uz, with the value the left hander [brings] at the top of the order, there wasn't a great deal of consideration of moving him. I guess Marn as the other part of the top three, he's been on record saying he'd like to be scoring runs, we'd love for him to be scoring more runs, but back up what Andrew said post Perth, as much with Marn it's about the method and intent as it is the outcome."