Mitchell Marsh may yet find himself back in Baggy Green this summer, with head coach Andrew McDonald confirming the all-rounder is “batting as well as he has for a long period of time” and could still be added to the Ashes squad.
Speaking on the eve of the five-match T20I series in India, McDonald accepted most of the questions were Ashes-related and made clear that recent white-ball form would not disqualify anyone from the Test side. “We would be comfortable picking someone, and if you want to put a name to it, Mitch Marsh, out of white-ball cricket, if we felt like that was going to benefit the Test team,” he said. “It’s very hard for him to vacate and balance out Test preparation, if he was to be in the window for that.”
Marsh has scored 555 runs in his last ten limited-overs innings and, even after losing his Test place during the India series last January, has done little to mute calls for a recall. McDonald stressed the selection panel’s ongoing interest. “We still haven’t given up on Mitch Marsh’s Test career,” he noted. “We feel he’s batting as well as he has for a long period of time.”
Scheduling could help. While Marsh captains the T20I side in India, Sheffield Shield rounds five and six overlap with the opening two Ashes Tests. Western Australia host South Australia under lights from 22 November before travelling to Melbourne. If Marsh is not in the XI for the first Test at Perth Stadium, those matches offer immediate, high-quality red-ball cricket.
Bowling remains the sticking point. Chronic ankle soreness meant he shelved his medium pace late last year and he has not turned the arm over since. Realistically, any Test return would see him play purely as a specialist batter at No. 4 or No. 5—roles he has filled comfortably in white-ball cricket—rather than the seam-bowling all-rounder Australia relied on in England two winters ago.
“I think he was one of our highest averages from Headingley to that point,” McDonald recalled of Marsh’s 2023 Ashes campaign, which featured a punchy hundred at Leeds but faded afterwards. “He hit a bit of a flat patch there, and we felt it best at that time to bring Beau Webster in.”
Marsh himself has oscillated between self-deprecation and stone-faced denial when asked about a comeback. In Christchurch last month he offered a curt “no” when quizzed on Test aspirations, later joking he would be “six beers deep” by lunch on day one in Perth, spectator’s ticket in hand.
While the middle order remains fluid, the top order still needs a partner for Usman Khawaja following David Warner’s retirement. Khawaja believes Matt Renshaw, his Queensland team-mate, has earned another opportunity. “He’s the best option to open right now,” Khawaja said this week, citing Renshaw’s improved technique against the new ball and calm temperament.
Renshaw last played a Test in India in 2023 and spent much of the previous domestic summer tinkering with his set-up. The left-hander has begun the Shield season solidly, and selectors value his versatility—he has opened, batted at three and slotted into the middle order for Australia A. The other main candidate is New South Wales right-hander Sam Konstas, incumbent after a late-season debut, but still short of first-class experience.
McDonald kept that race open-ended. The panel, he said, will balance statistical output with match-specific needs, pitch conditions and chemistry at the top. “We’re not locking ourselves into a single metric,” he explained. “Form matters, but so does the way a player’s game shapes up against England’s attack.”
For now, attention turns to the white-ball tour. Yet every run in the coming fortnight—whether in Indian heat or early-summer Shield fixtures back home—carries Ashes currency. Marsh, Renshaw and a handful of others know those scores could be the difference between pulling on sunglasses in the stands and donning the Baggy Green on 10 December.
