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‘Don’t Care How…’ – Former Australia Player Criticises Friend For Australia’s Declining Test Batting Returns After Shoddy Batting in 1st West Indies Test

Ashish Satyam

Last updated: June 29, 2025

3 min read

Aussie batters have been called out, despite winning the match by 150+ runs.

Former Australian player Ian Healy has slammed batting coach Michael Di Venuto after the team’s poor run under his supervision. The top order batters of Australia, apart from Travis Head, failed to make an impact in the pace-friendly conditions in the first Test against the West Indies. Despite winning the game by a massive margin of 159 runs against the West Indies, the likes of Sam Konstas, Cameron Green, and Josh Inglis were tormented by the hosts. The visitors made 180 and 310 runs in two innings.

They were exposed in the World Test Championship (WTC) 2023-25 Final too, where they lost the game to South Africa. After Marnus Labuschagne’s poor form as an opener, Australia added Konstas at the former’s expense in Barbados. However, the young batter failed terribly, scoring three and five runs respectively.

Ian Healy Not Happy With Australia Coach Michael Di Venuto

Healy castigated the Australian batting standards, especially in red-ball cricket.

“I love to put it back onto the players more than coaches usually. But, as I said, Australian cricket’s batting head coach – and every state batting coach – should be under pressure because there’s not enough runs being scored around the nation either. Michael Di Venuto – a friend of mine who is a good coach and a good man – has held the job since mid-2021. In this time, our national team batting has regressed in performance at the Test level. All that’s important to me is the performance. ‘I don’t care how you do it or what will make it easier for you – just get it done,” Healy said on SEN.

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Josh Inglis, who scored a century on debut, was asked to bat at Steve Smith’s position. But he failed to make an impact in the first Test against the West Indies, scoring five and 12 runs in two innings. Marnus Labuschagne has not scored a century since The Ashes in 2023. He has played seven Test matches across 2024-25, scoring 282 runs at an average of 25.63. Sam Konstas, who was asked to join the team in place of Labuschagne, has played a total of three Test matches. He has scored only 121 runs at an average of 20.16. On the other hand, veteran opener Usman Khawaja has smashed 479 runs across seven matches since 2024.

Citing the fact that Smith’s inclusion in the playing XI is still under the scanner, the top three batters of Australia have to fire. Australia’s No.3 position has been a constant concern, with the batters being inconsistent. Labuschagne has been out of colour for quite some time now. Cameron Green failed when he came to bat at one down. If Australia wants to do better in the ongoing Test series against the West Indies, their batters have to buckle up.

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