When Johan Botha was appointed as Queensland Bulls and Brisbane coach in May, it was obvious that the state was in for a shake-up.
Despite previous head men’s coach Wade Seccombe winning the Brisbane Heat’s first Big Bash League title in 11 years, poor performances in the 50-over and red ball formats had led to doubts about his leadership.
The safe internal choice would have been Ashley Noffke – a past Bull – who guided the Queensland Fire to their first Women’s National Cricket League title in 2021.
But, the hierarchy at Albion went for the outsider, to shake up a system that had seen the banana-benders claim their first Shield wooden spoon since 2007/08 and finish second-last in the Marsh Cup.
Lacklustre performances on-field, where the Bulls looked like they were going through the motions at points of the 2023-24 summer, have seen an injection of youth onto the playing list.
Contracts were handed out to Australian Under-19 World Cup-winning captain Hugh Weibgen, a bat and his Valleys teammate and fellow redhead fast bowler Callum Vidler.
A rookie contract was awarded to young New South Wales fast bowler Tom Straker, another Australian Under 19 representative, while fellow New South Welshman, batsman Lachlan Hearne was contracted following a strong season with the bat for Toombul.
Hearne made a promising fifty on debut against a strong soon-to-be Shield-winning Bulls bowling attack in the 2020/21 season at Wollongong.
But, despite making 34 and 65 in his fourth and final appearance for the Blues in March 2022, Hearne, a Mosman product, didn’t play a game the following season and made the move north to sign as captain for Toombul, having already played for the “Bulls” in the 2022 T20 Max tournament.
With Usman Khawaja looking towards life after cricket, Botha appointed fellow South African-born Australian Test bat Marnus Labuschagne to lead Queensland.
To get to know the group, Botha took the Bulls out to a farm in Queensland’s Scenic Rim where the team chopped wood and performed some farm work, but otherwise bonded in a mobile phone blackspot.
With Labuschagne on tour in England, Botha pulled his first surprise for Queensland’s season-opening one-day matches in Victoria by naming leg-spinner Mitch Swepson as captain.
Long-term deputy skipper stalwart and fan favourite Jimmy Peirson was dropped from the side altogether with Ben McDermott given the gloves.
The first results on the pitch have been mixed.
A quick-fire fifty for Matt Renshaw was the highlight in the Bulls’ Marsh Cup opener against Tassie which was abandoned due to rain.
Queensland opener Matthew Renshaw. (Photo by Steve Bell/Getty Images)
A quickfire cameo from Queensland Premier Cricket-leading runscorer Hearne on his Bulls debut was notable.
A competitive six-run loss against Victoria two days later saw skipper Swepson mix the pressure of captaincy with performance well by taking three wickets.
Tom Straker picked up his first pole for the Bulls.
The run chase was disappointing though with promising starts from openers McDermott and Khawaja ended by the spin of Murphy and the unlikely figure ex-Bull and Last Man Stands cult-hero Josh Brown. He had switched from the medium pace which had won Queensland a game in the final over last summer against New South Wales.
Some late hitting from Michael Neser ended with him holing out on the second last ball of the final over, which gave Victoria a second win.
The opening Shield game this week against three-time defending champions Western Australia gave Labuschagne the chance to make his state captaincy debut, in whites.
He has already attracted views online, including on this website, for positioning Mitch Swepson to stand directly behind the umpire, in what can only be described as a ‘mid’ position, while bowling a very tidy seam-up spell of 2 for 5.
Neser showed us all why he was on the national Test scene for four years, with a magnificent display of seam bowling.
Debutant Straker found it a little harder going wicketless at four-an-over.
Michael Neser. (AAP Image/Richard Wainwright)
A strong recovery from Josh Inglis and Sam Whiteman laid the platform for WA’s first innings total of 465, boosted by fifties Cooper Connolly and ex-Bull Cameron Gannon.
Queensland’s response saw some promising batting performances from Labuschagne, McDermott and Jack Clayton, who was shuffled around the order last summer due to Queensland’s batting woes.
Straker picked up his first wicket in the second innings, but Jack Wildermuth was the only Queensland bowler to exert any sort of control, as Mitch Marsh put WA into the dominant position in the match.
The fourth innings was mere batting practice for Khawaja and Labuschagne as the match petered out to a draw
Last night’s Marsh Cup encounter saw the Bulls recover from the loss of early wickets to post 300 thanks to Khawaja, Hearne (who posted his first fifty) and some late hitting from Neser.
It was all for naught, however, as WA chased down the target with an over to spare, Labuschagne perhaps bowling himself too much after trapping Cameron Bancroft LBW.
Young Western Suburbs quick Tom Whitney was the most expensive of the bowlers and was not able to capitalise on his dismissal of Cooper Connolly.
The Bulls now face a must-win white ball contest against South Australia at Albion this Friday.
Of interest elsewhere:
– One-time Australian player Sam Heazlett was told by the coaching staff last summer that he was still in Queensland’s beat 50-over side, but appears to be out of favour under the new regime despite good form for Redlands
– In Premier Cricket, Toombul were bowled out for 39 on the weekend on the Sunshine Coast with only two bowlers used. PNG international Chad Soper returned the figures of 10/8/4-5 for the Scorchers.