Australia’s selectors took a punt on Sam Konstas as Test opener – and he is left with the debt | Geoff Lemon

There was no firm basis to pick the teenager to begin with, but having done so, his only chance of success was to be backed as though there wasSam Konstas had given up. After his duck in Grenada, he looked devastated. After his duck in Jamaica, resigned. On body language, here was a player expecting to make nothing and expecting to be dropped. After his second shot at batting in the third Test proved futile, his second stint of fielding was one of absence: late to move, throwing one hand at the first dropped catch, snatching at the second, misfielding the run that let West Indies escape the lowest Test score. On the tour that might have been his making, nothing had gone right.You had to feel sorry for him, still 19 years old in a team of ancient dads. He had walked into his Test career full of bravura and left it five matches later with an average of 16. In nine innings since his 60 on debut he has averaged 11. The cockiness must have curdled to embarrassment. This is not to pile on to Konstas, a player attempting one of the hardest jobs in sport who still can’t buy a beer on transit home through Miami airport. Australia’s selectors, though, have done him a disservice, in what has turned out to be a crushing case of mismanagement. Continue reading...

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