"Australia Will Have Several Surprise Inclusions For England Tour": Ricky Ponting

Legendary cricketer Ricky Ponting has predicted some surprise inclusions in the Australian squad for the World Test Championship (WTC) final and the Ashes in England from the one that is currently touring India. Australia secured a place in the WTC final at The Oval in June after collecting the required percentage points following their nine-wicket win against India in the third Border-Gavaskar Test at Indore recently.

The spin-friendly tracks in India had prompted Australia to pick a squad suited to the sub-continent's conditions. They included Matt Renshaw and Peter Handscomb -- two supposedly good players of spin -- besides a clutch of spinners, including Nathan Lyon, Matthew Kuhnemann and Todd Murphy, for the series.

Ponting feels that with the English conditions not expected to be conducive to spinners, the selectors could opt for rookie pacers Lance Morris and Aaron Hardie for the two-month tour of England.

"Lance Morris is part of that (India) squad and maybe someone like Aaron Hardie (could be a surprise inclusion). I actually threw his (Hardie) name up when Cameron Green was going to miss that last Test (against South Africa due to finger injury) in Sydney," Ponting told ICC Review on Wednesday.

"I threw Aaron Hardie's name up as an all-rounder, a similar type of player to Green, not as quick with the ball, but a very good batsman who made a brilliant a hundred in the (domestic) Sheffield Shield final last year." The legend felt that if all-rounder Mitchell Marsh returns to full fitness, he could get the nod ahead of Hardie.

"But his (Hardie) selection might depend on someone like Mitchell Marsh, if he's back to full fitness, then he's probably going to find his way on the plane to England as a back-up