Former Australia cricketer Matthew Hayden feels that David Warner and Travis Head are the ideal duo to open for Australia at the upcoming ICC ODI World Cup which is set to begin on October 5.
The future of Warner in the national team has been the talk of the town since Australia secured the Ashes 2023 series.
The 36-year-old is walking in the twilight of his career and as the Australian team continues to go through transitions in various positions, Warner's chances of making an appearance in the World Cup continue to grow slim.
But for Hayden, Warner remains the ideal player to play in the opening slot.
"Head and Warner, I think, are your key openers. [Mitchell] Marsh can do a job. But in all conditions, when you look at the role that Marsh is going to play as an allrounder, I think a specialist opening a World Cup is important," Hayden said at an event in Mumbai as quoted by ESPNcricinfo.
"But if you're an Australian coach, you'd have no question going, 'We want Marsh to come up and open'. And his role can float in and around the order on any given day if they need to have quick runs inside the powerplay, for example, rather than, well, you talk about Travis; he's still got a strike rate of 96. So it's still an enormous strike rate. But Marsh can be someone that can have an impact at the top if on any given day they need to have a bigger powerplay than any other given opportunity," Hayden added.
The former opener further went on to talk about the captaincy situation of the Australian team. He feels that Steve Smith is the "wingman" of Pat Cummins who is different from the former captains, and currently has a lot on his plate, with the bowler leading the team in two out of the three formats.
"We've always had a very settled Australian captain with vast experience when you think back to the World Cups - Allan Border's World Cup-winning effort here in India [in 1987], [had] lots of experience," Hayden said.
"It was a legacy captaincy, and you could go right down through the ages: Ricky Ponting, [and] Michael Clarke - all World Cup winners, and all [with] vast experience. It's got to help, there's no doubt about it. But between the other characters like Steve Smith - you've seen how visible he is when Pat's got the ball in his hand, he's flapping around as he busily does anyway. But he has got a good wingman in Steve Smith as well, again with lots of experience. So, I'm not saying it's a team captaincy, but I think it's a solution that Australia's got covered," Hayden signed off.
