Adam Zampa’s red-ball ambition might be a punt not worth taking

A batsman like Cheteshwar Pujara, for instance, is as clear a ‘one-format specialist’ as there can be, yet even a player like him is often keen to ‘prove’ that he is qualified enough to play all three formats for the country; he even raised a few eyebrows by scoring a ton in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy last year. Pujara is just one of many - players like Ajinkya Rahane, Jason Roy, Jos Buttler and Aaron Finch, I’d argue, also fit into this category, but for some reasons, all these players intrinsically feel inferior when reasoned that maybe, just maybe, they are not cut out to be versatile. And mind you, there is absolutely nothing wrong in being a one-format wonder - a world-class cricketer in one format is still a world-class cricketer. 

From an Australian perspective, taking into account Test cricket and Test cricket only, it is kind of perfect - finally, they now have an experienced campaigner who understands the rigours of international cricket and could potentially bowl alongside Lyon or replace him; with Mitch Swepson or even Jon Holland, that would not have been the case. Experience is what the management have been longing for in the second-spinner role, and Zampa throwing his name into the hat would mean that they might organically lean towards potentially integrating him in the longest format. 

As much as we’d love to believe that a good spinner ought to succeed in all three formats of the game, that simply does not hold true in modern-day cricket. In fact, it could be argued that there has been no spinner in the past decade who’s enjoyed the same amount of success in both white and red-ball cricket - Ashwin ‘was’ that bowler but he longer is; Jadeja is manifolds better with the red-ball as compared to the white; Santner and Rashid are abominations in Test cricket; Lyon is barely effective in white-ball cricket and limited-over stints for both Maharaj and Yasir Shah turned out to be disastrous. 

From what we know thus far, Zampa perfectly fits into the Mitchell Santner and Adil Rashid category: his red-ball skills are calamitous. Or, at least, that’s what his first-class bowling average of 48.26 suggests. There has, of course, been arguments that Zampa has not really taken Shield cricket seriously, but even if that were to be true, there is no excuse to be averaging close to 50 on Adelaide wickets. But putting concerns over his red-ball record aside, the major component that needs to be taken into account is Zampa potentially - even for a temporary time-period - losing the grip hold he has on white-ball cricket right now; something he has worked on for years to get to where he is today. 

The first ODI versus New Zealand in March - which was incidentally the last international game before the pandemic brought the sport to a halt - depicted everything Zampa had become:  a reliable senior bowler to whom the captain could blindly throw the ball and expect a wicket in return. There, within four overs, he’d accounted for the wicket of both Williamson and Ross Taylor and enabled his side to defend 259 with ease. In action, in that game, was the fully evolved, complete version of himself the leg-spinner and his country had been yearning to see ever since he embarked on the journey called international cricket as a prodigal 23-year-old. Thus is it really worth for Zampa to weaken his hold in the already-conquered land in the hope of attaining a new one, which lies afar, in an alien territory?

His route to attain a Baggy Green cap might also be not so straightforward. Ahead of him in the pecking order are Mitchell Swepson and Jon Holland, both of who have been busting their backsides off in Shield cricket season after season. Come to think of it, Ashton Agar, too, might be more of a front-runner than Zampa for the second-spinner role in Tests. Zampa, with an average close to 50, has a long, long way to go to throw his name into the hat for selection, but the fact that he has a bulging reputation in his head might just end up working in his favour; again, we’re talking about a country which gave Michael Beer a Test cap based on Shane Warne’s recommendation, so it’s safe to say that nothing can be quite ruled out.