Ashes 2021-22: Usman Khawaja’s Test record over the last six years shows why selectors need to pick him for Hobart

Twin century king Khawaja has emphatically endorsed the policy introduced by National Selector George Bailey, which has made a point of trying to establish a culture of stability in the Australian dressing room to make it harder to get into the team than drop out.

For that reason, Khawaja expects to be denied a start in the final Ashes Test starting on Friday, and has applauded a process that may continue to show faith in teasing opener Marcus Harris still without a Test hundred in 14 matches.

But the numbers show that Khawaja is one of the better batsmen of his generation and the fact he has played significantly fewer Test matches than his contemporaries indicates he has been dealt a pretty rough deal by selectors throughout his career.

Khawaja’s historic back-to-back hundreds at the SCG has put him in elite company as one of only 10 international batsmen to have scored 10 career hundreds or more since 2015.

The left-hander has converted to triple figures at a better rate per innings than the likes of David Warner, Azhar Ali, Joe Root and Cheteshwar Pujara – yet he has played only 36 Tests in that period, when most others on the list have played 20 or 30 more.

According to Cricinfo, Khawaja has missed 30 Tests since 2015, an eye-watering number compared to the likes of Kane Williamson, Virat Kohli, Ali, Root, Pujara, Dimuth Karunaratne and Dean Elgar who have all been absent for only a single digit number of matches for their respective countries.

Steve Smith (10) and Warner (11) are the only other two who come close to Khawaja’s tally of 30 Tests on the sidelines, and that’s of course due to their ball tampering bans.

Khawaja averages 43 from 45 Tests, with not many Test batsmen averaging more than that in the modern era.

If anyone is owed a historical square up by selectors it would be Khawaja for the tough hand dealt for him since his debut way back in 2011.

“You can tell by the sentiment at the SCG, (people) felt he was hard done by being dropped on the 2019 Ashes,” said former Test star Simon Katich on SEN.

“Because there’s probably some inconsistencies with him paying the price with his spot in the team and other guys coming back to Australia and being able to keep their careers going.”

Khawaja has made another case to help out Harris and selectors by admitting that runs at No. 5 don’t equate to the rigours of opening the batting.

He knows, as a former top three player for most of his career.

Katich is another who played the majority of his career at the top, but he also played 22 matches in the middle-order and is adamant the change in position is not reason enough to drop Khawaja for Hobart.

According to Katich, selectors have no choice but to reward Khawaja, both for his “rare” form and for his clear body of work as one of the world’s best.

“The case should have been closed for him to stay in the team for Hobart after the first innings, let alone a second hundred,” said Katich.

“He’s just in imperious form. And there’s no way they can leave him out for Hobart. No way.

“When he’s in this sort of form against pace, spin you name it. When he’s playing this confidently, he’s as good as anyone in the world

“(He should play at) the top of the order with Warner. It’s hard, because I think Marcus Harris has looked OK at times. I thought he was really good in Melbourne. But the reality is when you look at the two players and compare their overall records, they’re miles apart and this is not having a go at Marcus Harris by any means.

“We’ve been crying out for guys to put their hands up with the bat the past few years to back up Smith, Labuschagne and Warner and Khawaja has done.

“At the moment, our best top four is Warner, Khawaja, Labuschagne and Smith.”