Is White a Better Punt than Clarke as the Next Australian Cricket Captain?
Like England with Alastair Cook, Australia already seems to have identified the successor to Ricky Ponting in Michael Clarke.
Now Clarke is a good batsman but I wonder if the Aussies are missing a trick here (like England are with Cook). I sense from a lot of my antipodean colleagues a slight uneasiness and even dislike of the man known as Pup. The general message being that Michael Clarke won’t do anything that doesn’t benefit Michael Clarke.
Whatever the merits or otherwise of Clarke, I wonder whether the Aussies would be better to look at Cameron White, who now that the selectors have realised is a batsman and not a leg spinner, seems to be doing rather well in the ODI format at least.
White is certainly good enough for the test side and at only 26 may even be next in line should the selectors lose patience with Marcus North. Arguably White’s hardhitting style is better suited to the number six role than North’s more accumulator style in any case. Plus the Victoria skipper’s leggies are probably better than North’s occasional spin to boot.
More importantly, White has bags of captaincy experience having led Victoria since 2003 and been pretty successful too in winning trophies and in gaining a reputation as an innovative skipper.
Frankly as a Pom I don’t really care and would actually prefer it if they appointed a captain who isn’t exactly going to trouble Mensa like Watson or Johnson, but White seems a better bet than Clarke.
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