Being dropped from Australia\u2019s Champions Trophy squad then missing out on a national contract days later may have felt a bit like losing a match after being smashed for consecutive sixes on the final two balls for seasoned \u2018death bowler\u2019 James Faulkner.<\/p>\n
Faulkner\u2019s double-blow in April was a stunning reversal for the all-rounder who was feted as man-of-the-match in the 2015 World Cup final when the hosts crushed New Zealand in front of a joyous crowd of 100,000 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.<\/p>\n
Some excited local media went as far to declare it the death-knell for Faulkner\u2019s international career after 67 ODIs, only weeks before his 27th birthday.<\/p>\n
The fast-bowling all-rounder knew better, however, and his spell in the freezer is set to end in India this month where Australia play the hosts in five ODIs.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was pretty tough,\u201d Faulkner said of his axing in comments published by Cricket Australia\u2019s website (cricket.com.au) on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think if you ask any player when you get left out, it\u2019s not great fun. So you have to rely on your friends and family and your team mates as well. I didn\u2019t get too much feedback (from selectors), to be honest. They said the pace has dropped down a little bit, maybe. But I bowl a lot of variations, so it\u2019s a tough one.\u201d<\/p>\n
From being surplus to requirements for Australia\u2019s winless Champions Trophy campaign in England, Faulkner is suddenly indispensable in India following injuries to pacemen Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and James Pattinson.<\/p>\n
The left-armer joins Pat Cummins, Nathan Coulter-Nile and Kane Richardson in a pace attack against India\u2019s formidable batting lineup.<\/p>\n
Faulkner used his time off wisely, putting in a \u2018pre-season\u2019 to nurse a troublesome knee back to health.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have been battling, to be honest, for probably the last 18 months, so it\u2019s been nice to be home in Tassie (Tasmania) with my team mates there and hit the gym hard,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy training definitely changed. I\u2019ve spent a lot of time on the bike, I haven\u2019t spent any time running other than fielding and net sessions when I\u2019m bowling.\u201d<\/p>\n
Faulkner is no stranger to conditions on the subcontinent, having played for four different teams in the Indian Premier League and in the 2013 limited overs tour of India when he announced himself with 230 runs and seven wickets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Being dropped from Australia\u2019s Champions Trophy squad then missing out on a national contract days later may have felt a bit like losing a match after being smashed for consecutive sixes on the final two balls for seasoned \u2018death bowler\u2019 James Faulkner. Faulkner\u2019s double-blow in April was a stunning reversal for the all-rounder who was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4576,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4575"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4575\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4577,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4575\/revisions\/4577"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}