In typically frank and insightful fashion at Australia’s main training session on Sunday,Khawaja recalled how he started a conversation with the International Cricket Council’s cricket manager,Wasim Khan,that has led to a revision of the system to better reward teams that – as Australia and England have done – play entertaining cricket.
“I was pretty frustrated with what was happening,” Khawaja said of a fines system that was leaving players on both sides with little if any of their match fees left. “I’m an ACA board member,so I do look at what’s[happening] around cricket. I just thought someone has to find a way to speak to the ICC about it.
“We had played three games,and they’d been three really good games with results[and] entertainment – the WTC[final] was the highest-watched Test match ever or something like that. Just really good stuff. And we were getting fined 80 per cent of our match fee. It’s a lot of money.
“Just really frustrating as a player. You are giving it your all out there,providing entertainment,then you are getting stung for it.[I] just felt like I needed to speak and Wasim was really good,got him on text,called him,we talked. He took the feedback.”
From there,the conversation broadened to Cummins,Australia’s coach Andrew McDonald and other teams.
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“Patty talked to him,Andrew McDonald talked to him,and,to his[Khan’s] credit,it wasn’t just listening and no action,” Khawaja said. “Actions happened within one or two weeks. They came back to us;there was a bit of compromise.
“We are trying to go as fast as we can. It’s the conditions that make it hard for us. If you are in India we are never behind the over-rate,[because we have] two spinners going at it. We were getting results,that’s what was frustrating. I think England were frustrated with it,too.
“Wasim Khan actually listening to the players,getting the feedback and finding the compromise,it’s the first time I’ve been involved that something like that has happened at ICC[level]. I think it’s a really good step forward.”
Khawaja has made similar interventions in Australia in order to aid the cause of greater diversity in the game,and was also an outspoken voicein support of the 2022 tour of Pakistan when some players and staff were wavering on the idea of going.
Usman Khawaja captained Australia against Derbyshire in 2019.Credit:Getty Images
Now aged 36,it seems unlikely Khawaja will captain Australia – outside the one tour game when he led the team against Derbyshire in 2019,just a couple of days before he was dropped for the Manchester Test. But he is making his mark with the broad support of his team.
Throughout this Ashes series,Khawaja has been calm at the crease,accumulating runs without once falling into the trap of trying to play at England’s faster tempo.
“I’d love to win the Ashes. It’s something all of us would love to do,” he said. “But I am so process-focussed now,it doesn’t bother me any more. I go about my process and what I can do for the team.
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“If I do that well enough and consistently enough,and the other guys do that,we can be the better team and win the Ashes. And if we do that,that’s when I’ll look back and celebrate and really enjoy.“
Might Khawaja,with all his past setbacks,be a key part of Australia’s first side to win the Ashes in England since 2001? That would be poetic indeed.
Watch every ball of the 2023 Ashes series live and exclusive on Channel 9 and 9Now.