Shaun Marsh is contemporary Australian cricket's foremost conundrum.
Now that Shane Watson has eased back into lime-green dotage, the older Marsh brother has inherited the title of Most Divisive Player.
For a few one-eyed Western Australians, Marsh is hard done by when it comes to national selection, in that he's kept floating around the Test squad without often making a playing XI.
But for those not blinded by dreams of resource-based secession, Marsh has been done a massive ongoing favour in even making those squads. There are many vocal critics, including your current correspondent, because here is a player who has never produced the first-class results that selectors claim are required.
He's been picked anyway. Various panels have all shown the same obsession with the idea that one day, even aged 33, an erratic player with an erratic career will magically come good.
And maybe — just maybe — the spell is being cast. In Colombo across the second and third days of this third and final Test against Sri Lanka, Marsh marked his return to the team in place of Joe Burns with Australia's first century of a miserable batting series.
He ended on 130, more in one innings than any Australian this series had managed in four combined. Steve Smith followed up with 119, the partnership of 246 Australia's second-highest in Sri Lanka. The highest, 258, was recorded by Marsh with Mike Hussey on the former's 2011 Test debut.
For a few one-eyed Western Australians, Marsh is hard done by when it comes to national selection, in that he's kept floating around the Test squad without often making a playing XI.
But for those not blinded by dreams of resource-based secession, Marsh has been done a massive ongoing favour in even making those squads. There are many vocal critics, including your current correspondent, because here is a player who has never produced the first-class results that selectors claim are required.
He's been picked anyway. Various panels have all shown the same obsession with the idea that one day, even aged 33, an erratic player with an erratic career will magically come good.
And maybe — just maybe — the spell is being cast. In Colombo across the second and third days of this third and final Test against Sri Lanka, Marsh marked his return to the team in place of Joe Burns with Australia's first century of a miserable batting series.
He ended on 130, more in one innings than any Australian this series had managed in four combined. Steve Smith followed up with 119, the partnership of 246 Australia's second-highest in Sri Lanka. The highest, 258, was recorded by Marsh with Mike Hussey on the former's 2011 Test debut.
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