Matthew Wade considered skipping Australia A’s tour of England in June, after he found himself in a ‘sticky situation’ when the expected birth of his child coincided with the Ashes trials.
“I was probably going to pass on the Australia A tour because we were going to have the baby and I rang [wife] Julia during the [final] Shield game and basically told her I was a chance to get picked in that Australia A tour and she told me to go,” Wade said on Saturday, July 27. “So all credit to her, to be honest. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”
JUST IN: Australia have named their Ashes squad. https://t.co/Oi7BtBCRLz
— Wisden (@WisdenCricket) July 26, 2019
Wade eventually made a late entry into the Australia A squad, and top-scored in the List A games with 355 runs at 88.75, forcing his way into the 17-man Ashes squad, and earning a chance to feature in his first Test since September 2017.
“It was probably a bit challenging throughout the Australian summer,” he said, “trying to respect the selectors and respect my teammates when other people were getting picked, it was probably a little bit of a challenge for a little bit there.”
Having ended the 2018-19 Sheffield Shield as the second highest run-getter with 1021 runs at 60.05, Wade believed he had already done enough to merit a Test selection, before he faced the ‘A’ tour dilemma.
Wade, who was elevated to one-day captaincy in 2017, but lost his ODI and Test ‘keeping spots to Tim Paine a year later, admitted that he has no qualms in being the back-up keeper to Paine for the tour.
“It’s just a luxury that I’ve played 20 Tests and a lot of one-dayers as a ‘keeper that if something happens to Tim on the morning of a Test then I can stand in and ‘keep. I’ve got no issues there. I’ve been away for a long time and I am excited to be back.”
