Cricket Australia selectors are confident Travis Head can transfer his red-hot form in Test cricket to the white-ball format of the game after calling him into the T20 squad to face Sri Lanka.
Australia are priced at 10/3 to defend the T20 World Cup which will take place on home soil at the end of the year and Head will now get his chance to cement his place.
Lengthy T20 absence
Head has not played white-ball cricket with Australia since 2018 but has been included in the 16-man squad that will take on Sri Lanka in a five-match series next month.
Cricket Australia have made the call after Head starred during the 4-0 Ashes series win over England, going on to win the player-of-the-series.
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Head had fallen out of favour in white-ball cricket well before the ODI World Cup in 2019 but chairman of selectors George Bailey says he deserves another chance.
"It's one of those conundrums that a number of players face, when they do get a bit of a run in one format or the other. Be that domestically or for the national side," Bailey said. "It quite often comes at the expense of another format.
"But Trav is a very talented cricketer across all three formats. He's a quality striker of the ball. We're just looking to get him involved in as much of the white-ball stuff as we can."
Strong competition
Bailey says there will not be sweeping changes to the squad that recently won the T20 World Cup but the door is still open for players like Head to squeeze in.
"He provides a little bit of flexibility," Bailey said of Head. "Obviously there's not going to be a huge amount of change from that World Cup crew we had last year.
"But what we are after are really specific replacements and (providing) opportunities for guys, should the need arise to use them in the lead up to October."
