Australia's Cameron Green speaks on bowling plans ahead of home Ashes series

Melbourne [Australia], October 3 (ANI): Australian all-rounder Cameron Green said that while he is hoping for an unrestricted role as an all-rounder during the upcoming Ashes series at home starting in November, he could take up a lesser load as a bowler if he is batting at the top-order spot.

Green, who is not a part of the ongoing T20Is against New Zealand, will be playing at fourth spot for Western Australia in his first Sheffield Shield outing in 18 months. He expects a return to the number three spot when the first Ashes Test is played at Perth on November 21.

The 26-year-old will also be bowling during the match for the first time since he underwent back surgery a year ago. He also confirmed that the medical staff has restricted him to bowling just eight overs during the Shield match against New South Wales from Saturday onwards, as per cricket.com.au. This is all being done to facilitate his gradual return to long-form bowling, and he expects to play ODIs against India at home in October.

This could leave him with as many as three Shield matches to play before the Ashes, all of them scheduled to take place in Perth. His bowling workload will remain limited across these fixtures, with medical staff monitoring his overs closely across seven innings in the lead-up to the first Test. However, Green hopes to be fully available without any restrictions by the time the Ashes series gets underway.

"That has been the plan the whole year. That is why it has been such a slow build-up, so that you are peaking by the time the Ashes comes around," he said as quoted by cricket.com.au.

Green said that caution could be taken with his bowling if he stays at the top spot, which he took up during the winter on his return to the side as a batter. The right-hander was rusty intially, failing to pass 15 in his first four innings, two in the ICC World Test Championship final against South Africa and the first Test against West Indies at Barbados.

But he slowly found his groove despite tough batting surfaces in the Caribbean, with his later scores of 52, 26, 42 and 46 being absolute golden given how low-scoring matches were.

Skipper Pat Cummins could keep him at first drop to keep the top-order settled, if Usman Khawaja, in particular, gets a new opening partner. Coach Andrew McDonald also spoke of "front-ending" Green's overs during Australia's bowling innings against England so that he is not drained during his batting.

If Beau Webster, another all-rounder in the set-up, bats at six, it could give Cummins way more flexibility in rotating his bowlers through a long innings.

There have been guys who have done it," Green said. "Shane Watson used to open the batting and bowl. People probably do not realise how tough that was.

"Spending so long in the field bowling and then being expected to go out there and bat the last 10 overs of the day is really challenging."

"I am in a bit of a different place (to Watson). Let us say I am batting up the top, and Beau's batting six, for example, maybe he might take more of the (bowling) load," he continued.

Returning to the bowling crease would mark the final stage of Green's carefully looked-after return to cricket after a spinal fusion operation in Christchurch.

"It was just a really slow buildup, there was no rushing," Green said of his rehabilitation after surgery.

"The beauty of the 12 months was that there was no really important cricket before then, so it just gave me a really good opportunity, a bit of a clean slate, to get that really right. If there was a World Cup six months post-surgery, you might try and rush back for that, but the beauty was that I had so much time to get it right."

"Hopefully the surgery ... holds up really well. Back injuries are something you cannot really control. It is just part of being a fast bowler. You can do everything right in the gym, action-wise, body-wise, and restrictions-wise, and it still may happen. That is the unfortunate thing of being a fast bowler," he concluded. (ANI)

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