“He is so disillusioned with the whole set up”

Image courtesy of: Zimbio

Former Australia pace bowler Rodney Hogg believes that all-rounder James Faulkner won’t represent the national team ever again.

Hog’s comments come after Faulker was omitted from the list of centrally contracted players for the 2017/18 season.

Faulkner was not the only player to miss out though as Steve O’Keefe, Shaun Marsh and Peter Siddle were also overlooked.

Since they were snubbed, Ashton Agar, Hilton Cartwright and Billy Stanlake received central contracts for the first time in their careers.

“Selectors have just run a line through James Faulkner who I feel is in the top four best one-day all-rounders ever for Australia,” Hogg told SEN’s The Run Home. “Earlier in the year, Faulkner got a contract from Lancashire worth 120,000 pounds to play some games prior to the Champions Trophy in June.

“He told Cricket Australia and they said ‘no, you can’t do it’. They wanted him to (rest) up and keep himself cherry ripe for the Champions Trophy. They don’t pick him and then they drop him from the contract.”

Given that Faulkner was not among the list of contracted players, Hogg pointed out that the 27-year-old could become a Twenty20 maverick and play in domestic Twenty20 competitions around the world.

“You’ll never see James Faulkner play for Australia again,” he said. “He will go off and play T20 cricket. He is so disillusioned with the whole set up.”