Bailey was unimpressed with Laughlin’s performances against Sri Lanka

Australia Twenty20 captain George Bailey has admitted that the national team are in desperate need of a death bowler, especially after suffering a 27-run defeat against the West Indies.

Bailey noted that death bowlers will play a crucial role in the Australian Twenty20 side over the next few years, but especially in 2014 since the International Cricket Council (ICC) World Twenty20 will be held in Bangladesh.

Australia do not have many Twenty20 Internationals scheduled between now and the next World Twenty20 and this is a major concern to Bailey, who stated that he was desperate to see the country move up the rankings, where they currently sit at a lowly seventh.

The main problem for Australia in Twenty20 Internationals is the huge amount of runs scored against them in the final few overs and this turned out to be the key reason why they lost both their Twenty20 Internationals against Sri Lanka.

While pace bowler Ben Laughlin was extremely expensive during both matches, giving away 20 runs from his last over in Melbourne, while faring no better in the first match in Sydney, where he was hammered for 19 runs off his last five deliveries.

However, he was not the only culprit, as the last five overs in the Melbourne Twenty20 cost Australia 60 runs.

During the first Twenty20 in Sydney, Australia were only able to score 36 runs in the last five overs as they struggled to find the gaps and failed to pick a lot of the deliveries bowled by seamer Lasith Malinga.

“That’s probably the gap between the best T20 team in the world and the seventh best,” Bailey said. “Hopefully we’ll learn a lot about that. I think we’ve got some bowlers in our side who can be world-class at T20. There’s great foundations there. I thought James Faulkner was really good tonight. Mitchell Starc has been outstanding, Glenn Maxwell’s two back-to-back games have been really good with the ball. There’s some good stuff there.

“There’s a huge opportunity there for a bowler to step up, and not just for T20. I think if a bowler can step up and nail their death stuff they’re almost walking into our one-day side as well. If I was a bowler it would have to be a huge source of excitement, something certainly to be working towards.”

While Bailey was disappointed at Laughlin’s performance during both Twenty20 Internationals, the question of whether he retains his spot for the next Twenty20 series still remains unknown.

“That’s what he’s in the side for,” Bailey said. “He’s in the side to do what Lasith Malinga does for them, to be able to nail his death stuff, to be hard to hit through the middle with his change-ups. He’s got a great amount of variation but Lasith will tell you the same thing, if you’re not putting the ball where you want then at this level you will be made to pay.

“I still think Benny has the skills to do it, so it’s nice that he’s had a look at international level and knows exactly what he has to go away and work on or how he has to find a way to relax so he can execute as well as he did during the domestic summer.”

Australia coach Mickey Arthur was also frustrated by the losses, but noted that left-arm pace bowler Mitchell Starc was an excellent death bowler and added that the national team would seriously benefit if they found another consistent bowler like him.

“It is a problem for us and it’s something we’re looking to solve pretty quick and we need to get some answers,” Arthur said. “We work fairly hard on it and we’ve just got to identify guys who can do it consistently for us, that’s the key. We thought we had picked some really good death bowlers and the domestic BBL shows that they were the best, if you looked at the stats. They still are.

“I spoke to the guys the other night after the game in Sydney and the guys have actually seen what the level is. We had pretty much a BBL all-stars side playing. We took the best of the BBL and gave them an opportunity here. I think they’ve seen what the difference is between playing and being successful at a domestic level and then trying to do it at international level. We’ve been short in that department.”