Pat Cummins backs Usman Khawaja for fifth Test selection

Khawaja hit twin hundreds in the fourth Test at the MCG, a performance which the Australia captain says is “pretty hard to go past”

Pat Cummins has backed Usman Khawaja to remain in Australia’s XI for the fifth Test after producing a player of the match-winning performance on his return to the side at the MCG.

Khawaja came into the side for the fourth Test as a Covid replacement for Travis Head and scored back-to-back centuries in his first international outing since August 2019.

In the first innings, he struck 137 runs off 260 balls to help Australia to 416 for 8 before adding a rapid 101 runs (138 balls) in the second.

Despite scoring 238 runs in Melbourne, Khawaja admitted he was prepared to return to drinks duty in Hobart with Head out of isolation, commenting: "At the moment I’m quite resigned to the fact that I’ll probably miss out. That’s just from talking to [head selector] George Bailey about continuity."

^{Usman Khawaja celebrates his century in the first innings [Cameron Spencer/Getty Images]}

However, speaking after the conclusion of the fourth Test, skipper Cummins put his support behind Khawaja’s continued selection.

"I’ll preface it by saying I’m not a selector, but when someone comes out and hits twin hundreds, it’s pretty hard to go past them for the week after,” he said. "We’ll work through that; the selectors will work through that in the next few days.

"But when someone’s running hot, has got a heap of experience like Uzzy, the way he plays is fantastic."

Head, himself, is unlikely to remain on the sidelines after scoring 248 runs at 62 in the first three Tests.

If both Head and Khawaja are selected, out-of-form opener Marcus Harris is the most likely candidate to miss out. The 29-year-old has scored 179 runs at 29.83 in seven innings. Khawaja, meanwhile, has scored 484 runs in five innings as an opener.

"I guess that's why he was the spare batter and picked in the squad originally," Cummins said. "It felt like he could replace any batter from no.1 to no.6 really well. He's hugely versatile."

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