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The Ashes could provide one cause for celebration, but this contest will also witness the Australian team host a greater number of birthdays than Timezone in the nineties. Recent addition Jake Weatherald celebrated his thirty-first birthday a day before the team was named. Nathan Lyon celebrates 38 the day preceding the Perth Test. Beau Webster reaches 32 just ahead of the Brisbane match, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on day two in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood becomes 35 on the final day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 before January is over.

Older Team Interest Builds

For a couple of years there has been growing fascination with the age of this side and particularly the bowling unit. It is unusual to have nearly all player in a Test side being over 30, aside from novelty-sized mascot Cameron Green and custody-weekend visitor Sam Konstas. But it wasn't necessarily true that older age was a disadvantage: a Test team featuring a four-man attack with 1,568 wickets between them is hardly a disadvantage, and it stands to reason that all of those bowlers are well into their professional lives.

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Perhaps what really highlighted the talking point is that the reserve players over that period, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also deep into their 30s. Younger bowlers have floated into teams – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before disappearing for years with injuries, meaning there has been no clear line of succession.

Transition Forced by Setbacks

So far, that hasn’t mattered, as the core four plus Boland have kept on backing up. Any team knows that having a group of same-generation players might mean a batch of simultaneous departures, but so far transition has remained hypothetical: a process that would certainly be arriving the mountain when she comes, but one that had not become visible.

Now, suddenly, change is here, forced upon this Aussie team in the space of a short period. The spinal issue to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would likely only miss the opening match, was the team management assessment, and as the first-change bowler behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could comfortably be replaced by Boland.

But now that Hazlewood has been sidelined with a hamstring strain, the team balance undergoes a far greater shift with two key bowlers absent rather than a single one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two accurate right-arm bowlers give the balance and control that allows Starc’s left-arm speed and movement to be used more as a attacking option. Missing both of them means a fundamental shift in the composition of the team. Boland handling the new ball is nothing new in his first-class career, but he has been so successful in Test matches coming on after seven or eight overs of initial onslaught. Now he’ll probably have to be the opening bowler.

Newcomer Confronts Expectations

Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at thirty-one years of age himself isn't an intimidated youngster, but he might become an nervous thirty-one-year-old. A packed stadium, half of it English, for the opening Test of a deliriously anticipated Ashes series will not make for an easy debut, no matter how many newspaper profiles describe him as relaxed. He could be brought onto the ground on a sun lounger and still be anxious.

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Who knows, it might all go swimmingly for this new attack. It might not work out. What is striking is how quickly Australia have moved from the certainty of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the uncertainty of Starc, Lyon, and others. It's unclear what new injuries the opening match may bring. Who knows whether Cummins will be fit for Brisbane, and good to back up after Brisbane, given how complicated stress injuries can be. It's uncertain how long Hazlewood might be sidelined, with a history of going down early in series and a pattern of initially small injuries turning into extended absences.

Future Uncertain

The back half of the series may see the primary four bowlers back together and all performing well. Or it might experience transition beginning much sooner than the stretch goal of 2027 in England. Not through Neser, who is apparently the next option and could be a great pink-ball Brisbane option, but after that with options unclear. Sean Abbott was in the initial squad, though he’s now also hurt and has not yet played a Test. Richardson has just had his injury-prone arm repaired, and this format is not the place for gradually starting one’s work. After them lies the real unknown, and amid it all opportunity for the opposing side. You can sense that train approaching, rolling round the bend, and England hasn't seen the success since they can't recall when.