The batsman axed from Australia's Test team for the tours of the West Indies and England, Joe Burns, has been urged to look at his selection for the overlapping Australia A tour of India as a chance to make himself a more rounded batsman.
Burns, 25, was chosen ahead of Adam Voges to play in the last two Tests of the Australian summer. He averaged 36.5 across his four innings against India and finished the Sheffield Shield season with 793 runs at 52.87. That was not enough to preserve his position, with Voges finishing the season with a mighty 1358 runs at 104.46.
Chief selector Rod Marsh defended the decision to prefer the 35-year-old Voges, and said it could ultimately benefit Burns, who could be a contender to move to opener, the position he fills with Queensland, in the Test team once Chris Rogers departed.
"It's worked out quite nicely for Joe in a lot of ways, in as much as he'll be going to India, where he's never played cricket. He'll have two four-day matches and five one-day matches in India and I reckon that will be very, very good for his overall development as a batsman," Marsh said on Tuesday.
Usman Khawaja's comeback to cricket after a knee injury that ruined most of his season will be complemented by captaining the Australia A squad that also features Pat Cummins and Glenn Maxwell.
Queensland's Khawaja has been appointed captain for both the four-day and one-day portions of the tour ahead of Sheffield Shield-winning captain Matthew Wade of Victoria, who was trumped by NSW's Peter Nevill for the role of understudy wicketkeeper for the Test tours of the West Indies and England.
" Nev [Nevill] . . . he's bashing the door down," Marsh explained. "Matthew Wade had a very good season as well. I don't know what you can read into the fact we picked Wade in the A team - that's up to you to read something into it if you want to."
Cummins' bid to return to Test cricket will take another step with his selection in the July tour. The 21-year-old has only played two first-class matches since his dazzling Test debut in 2011, both in mid-2013 in an Australia A tour of Zimbabwe and South Africa.
The squad does not include James Pattinson, who suffered hamstring injuries in each of his last two shield matches of the season, nor all-rounder James Faulkner. Maxwell has only been chosen in the four-day squad, having clearly proven his limited-over credentials at international level.
Cummins and NSW teammate Gurinder Sandhu are the only pacemen chosen for both the four-day and one-day matches.
Tasmania's Andrew Fekete earned selection for the red-ball squad by finishing second in the shield wicket tally in the just-completed summer with 37 wickets at an average of 24.11.
NSW's Sean Abbott and Western Australia's Nathan Coulter-Nile will replace Fekete for the one-day matches.
Left-arm finger-spinner Ashton Agar will feature in the whole series. NSW's Stephen O'Keefe will join him for the four-day matches, with leg-spinners Cameron Boyce of Queensland and Adam Zampa of South Australia to feature in the one-dayers.
Besides Khawaja, Burns and wicketkeeper Wade, Victoria's Peter Handscomb and SA's Travis Head are the batsmen to feature in both squads.
Cameron Bancroft (WA), Marcus Stoinis (Victoria) and Nic Maddinson (NSW) are in the four-day squad, with Chris Lynn (Queensland) and Callum Ferguson (SA) chosen in the one-day squad.
AUSTRALIA A FOUR-DAY SQUAD FOR INDIA TOUR: Usman Khawaja (Qld - c), Matthew Wade (Vic - vc), Ashton Agar (WA), Cameron Bancroft (WA), Joe Burns (Qld), Pat Cummins (NSW), Andrew Fekete (Tas), Peter Handscomb (Vic), Travis Head (SA), Nic Maddinson (NSW), Glenn Maxwell (Vic), Stephen O'Keefe (NSW), Gurinder Sandhu (NSW), Marcus Stoinis (Vic).
AUSTRALIA A ONE-DAY SQUAD FOR INDIA TOUR: Usman Khawaja (Qld - c), Matthew Wade (Vic - vc), Sean Abbott (NSW), Ashton Agar (WA), Cameron Boyce (Qld), Joe Burns (Qld), Nathan Coulter-Nile (WA), Pat Cummins (NSW), Callum Ferguson (SA), Peter Handscomb (Vic), Travis Head (SA), Chris Lynn (Qld), Gurinder Sandhu (NSW), Adam Zampa (SA).
