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In the past two years, Australia has won the T20 World Cup, World Test Championship, retained the Ashes in England and claimed a sixth ODI World Cup.
From that ODI squad, five were part of the World Cup final winning team in 2015, nine won the T20 World Cup and eight were in the WTC side.
In November 2021, Pat Cummins took over as captain of the Test team and was named skipper for the one-day format a year later. His status as one of Australia’s best captains is growing by the day.
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With the successes piling up, this Australian side has risen to be among the greatest, rivalling teams led by Mark Taylor, Steve Waugh, Ricky Ponting and in a bygone era, Sir Donald Bradman.
Cummins’ men have had to contend with stinging criticism by legends from the great teams of the recent past, particularly after Justin Langer’s resignation.
Matthew Hayden identified the lack of former greats in the coaching staff, while Ian Healy has previously suggested the side wasn’t playing with a ruthless after a transition to a much calmer identity under Cummins.
But a 2023 World Cup victory may have silenced them.
The debate is now real in regards to where Cummins’ men rank among the great sides before them.
In the late 1990s to 2000s, Steve Waugh’s side went on a 16-match Test winning streak. The last victory came against India in India.
Ricky Ponting’s side is also in folklore.
In 2003 and 2007 he led Australia to World Cup victories, while also winning the 2006/07 Ashes series 5-0. However, there was the 2005 series Australia lost 2-1, which was the first time England had won since 1986-87.
With that considered, where does this Australian team rank among the greatest?
Former Australian captain Ian Chappell doesn’t believe there’s a need to compare.
“It’s pointless, all you know is this is a very good team, it’s very well captained and the attack, particularly the pace part of the attack has been exceptional,” he told Wide World of Sports.
In his column for The Telegraph, former England captain Michael Vaughan wrote that five players are now on par with Australia’s best.
“This group of Australian players had the misfortune of following one of the greatest teams in history, that of the nineties and noughties,” he wrote.
“It is difficult to always be compared to legends of the past. By winning a World Cup in India, the hardest place to do it, they have now achieved something the greats of old never did.
“I think some of these names – Warner, Smith, Cummins, Starc, Hazlewood – should now stand with Ponting, Waugh, Gilchrist, Warne and McGrath. They are a special team.”
What made Australia’s World Cup win remarkable was their start to the tournament.
The criticism was coming for Pat Cummins’ men after two losses to start against India and South Africa.
In their third match, Sri Lanka were 0-125 in the first innings and looked as if they could pull off an upset.
However, Cummins rallied the troops to remove both openers as Australia went on to win.
”They were under pressure after two defeats, the captain was under pressure, people questioned strategy, tactics and personnel,” fellow former England captain Michael Atherton said on Sky Sports.
“They have done it the hard way on a pudding of a pitch that would be so different to one at home, and against a tip-top team.”
One of the players that symbolised Australia’s ability to peak at the right time was Mitchell Starc.
The left-armer was rested for the final round match against Bangladesh, having only taken 10 wickets at an average of 43.90.
In the semi-final, he came back with a vengeance, taking 3-34 before following it up with 3-55 in the final.
Chappell believes that’s down to how Australia prepared for the finals as a whole.
“I think that was a credit to the Australian team, it was almost as though they set themselves for the finals … they immediately sent out a signal the way they fielded in the semi-final and the fact that not just Starc, but Hazlewood and Cummins, they all took wickets that were really important,” he said.
“I think that’s what’s crucial in this team, they knew when good stuff was required and they performed.”
With his 16 wickets in the series, Starc now sits third on the all-time leading wicket-takers list for ODI World Cups.
Glenn McGrath is first with 71, Muttiah Muralitharan second with 68 while Starc has 65.
Starc has only played 28 matches though, while McGrath’s wickets came in 39 and Muralitharan featured in 40.
Former Test bowler, and Starc’s old teammate, Trent Copeland, thinks the left-arm quick has put himself into World Cup folklore.
“His numbers are ridiculous, maybe a little bit of recency bias comes in when talking about what his career means for Australian cricket but his numbers are remarkable and he should be one of those bowlers that goes down in history as potentially our greatest white ball bowler of all time,” he said on the ABC’s Grandstand Cricket podcast.
“If you’re comparing it to a batting context, the Pontings and Warners of the world, it’s right there in a bowling context, it’s quite astonishing.”
With the legacy of this squad considered, now comes the question of how many will feature in the 2027 World Cup?
Starc (33), Warner (37), Smith (34), Mitchell Marsh (32), Glenn Maxwell (35), Adam Zampa (31), Josh Hazlewood (32) and Marcus Stoinis (34) are all on the wrong side of 30.
And whether it’s pointless or not, the debate should rage for a long time as to whether that group of players was simply the best.
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