{"id":342705,"date":"2023-10-30T06:07:43","date_gmt":"2023-10-30T07:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=342705"},"modified":"2023-10-30T08:01:34","modified_gmt":"2023-10-30T08:01:34","slug":"head-lauded-as-australias-most-important-batter-after-blitz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=342705","title":{"rendered":"Head lauded as Australia's 'most important' batter after blitz"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Australian Test captain\ufeff Tim Paine<\/a> has heaped praise onto batter Travis Head<\/a>, after stellar 59-ball century in Australia's five-run victory over New Zealand<\/a> on his cricket World Cup debut.<\/p>\n

Head opened the batting with David Warner and smashed \ufeff109 runs off just 67 balls, making a mighty return after he was sidelined with a fractured hand<\/a> <\/p>\n

Paine, who captained \ufeffAustralia's Test team form 2018 to 2021, acknowledged that the new management of the side, now led by Pat Cummins, has allowed Head's aggressive batting style to flourish.<\/p>\n

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"The most impressive thing about this (win) was Travis Head coming o\ufeffff a spell, he said himself he'd had two hits in the nets," Paine said on SEN Radio on Monday.<\/p>\n

\"Travis<\/p>\n

"(He has an) extraordinary skill level to walk out against a high quality attack and hit the middle of the bat from ball one."<\/p>\n

Paine didn't shy away from claiming Head is now the key to Australia's success across T20, ODI and Test cricket after his impressive knock.\ufeff<\/p>\n

"I think he's become our most important batter in all three forms now," Paine said.<\/p>\n

"Credit to him. To have him back in the side as we build towards the back end of the tournament where you want and need to be playing your best cricket, we're starting to look pretty good."<\/p>\n

But Head's confidence and influence at the crease didn't come easy, as his former captain Paine knows.<\/p>\n

\"Starc<\/p>\n

"He is one of the cricketers going around the world at the moment that can swing a game in your favour really quickly," Paine said.<\/p>\n

"What we're starting to see now is that he can do it consistently at the highest level.<\/p>\n

"He can take the situation and pressure out of the game. He will go out and play exactly the same way. Players that can do that \ufeffare worth their weight in gold.<\/p>\n

"We've seen improvement come because he's batting consistently at the top of the order in 20-over and 50-over cricket\ufeff."<\/p>\n

\ufeffIt wasn't just Paine who was impressed by Head's fearless return.<\/p>\n

\"Travis<\/p>\n

Australian cricketing legend Ricky Ponting was also full of praise<\/p>\n

"He simply didn't miss the middle of the bat," Ponting said on commentary during Saturday's match.<\/p>\n

"He just went from ball one, set the tone.<\/p>\n

"He let New Zealand know that Australia were here to play."\ufeff<\/p>\n

The Australians have had an emphatic turnaround since being smashed by India and South Africa in their \ufefffirst two matches of the tournament, with three wins coming against New Zealand, the Netherlands, Sri Lanka and Pakistan.<\/p>\n

They now face a struggling England, who have won just a single match so far, \ufeffon Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former Australian Test captain\ufeff Tim Paine has heaped praise onto batter Travis Head, after stellar 59-ball century in Australia's five-run victory over New Zealand on […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":342357,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342705"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=342705"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":342710,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342705\/revisions\/342710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/342357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=342705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=342705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=342705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}