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Bancroft not dreaming of Ashes call-up yet

Cameron Bancroft has made a stunning return to red-ball cricket, but says he needs to do plenty more before deserving another crack at Test cricket.

Cameron Bancroft
Cameron Bancroft has downplayed talk of an Ashes berth after a fine return to the Sheffield Shield. (AAP)

Cameron Bancroft insists it's too early to start dreaming about a Test recall just yet despite his stunning return to red-ball cricket.

Bancroft scored an unbeaten 138 off 358 balls in Western Australia's first innings against NSW, before following it up with 86 off 263 balls in the second dig.

His 621-ball marathon at the crease fell just short of the all-time Sheffield Shield record of 649 set by Steve Waugh in 1996.

WA ended up losing the match by an innings and 51 runs.

But Bancroft's knock - his first in red-ball cricket since serving a nine-month ban for ball tampering - has immediately thrust him into the selection mix for this year's Ashes.

Bancroft will battle it out with the likes of Marcus Harris and Joe Burns for a spot in the Test XI.

Not that Bancroft is allowing himself to dream just yet.

"I've played one game. You don't earn the right after one game to achieve a feat like playing Test cricket," Bancroft said.

"I feel like I still have plenty of work to do. But it's really awesome to be back playing for WA in Shield cricket, and I'm loving it so far."

Harris scored 95 and 174 for Victoria in their win over Queensland, while Burns scored 60 and 80 in that same match.

Bancroft said he wouldn't focus on what the likes of Burns and Harris were doing.

"The intention of why I'm playing and rocking up to prepare is because of course I'd love to play for Australia again one day," Bancroft said.

"Whenever that is, I'll leave that to a power greater than myself.

"As long as I'm living each moment to the best of my ability, everything else will take care of itself."

Bancroft said he used his nine-month ban from the game to work on some technical aspects of his batting.

"When you're playing games of cricket for a long period of time, and playing games back to back, you can put bandaids over a lot of things to do with your basics," Bancroft said.

"I feel like taking that time and space to work on those things has helped.

"I haven't mastered the game of cricket by any stretch of the imagination. But I feel like spending that time and energy was a really positive thing for me."

Bancroft will be back in action when WA host South Australia in a Sheffield Shield clash at the WACA Ground, starting Sunday.


3 min read

Published

Source: AAP



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