Australian captain Michael Clarke and young paceman James Pattinson were Wednesday ruled out of the tri-series decider against Sri Lanka, as coach Mickey Arthur demanded a new strategy. Clarke scored a century in Australia's crushing loss to Sri Lanka as the visitors levelled the series 1-1 in Adelaide on Tuesday, but it came at a price.
He strained a hamstring which not only ruled him out of the final tri-series game on Thursday, but could also see him miss the start of this month's tour of the West Indies where Australia will play five One-dayers and three Tests. "It doesn't look great for certainly the early part of the One-day series in the West Indies," Arthur told reporters of Clarke, who was due to have scans later Wednesday.
Clarke only returned to action last weekend from a strain to his right hamstring, which sidelined him for three games. Pattinson will also miss the match with a buttock strain. Sri Lanka blazed to an emphatic eight-wicket victory Tuesday with the World Cup finalists easily running down Australia's 271 for six to post 274-2 with 34 balls to spare.
Arthur was not happy with the scale of the defeat and said Australia needed to go back to the drawing board. "It simply wasn't good enough. There was no excuse for it," he said. "We need to play in a different way in these conditions which are totally different.
"We have had a couple of serious chats... we are looking at ways we can beat Sri Lanka in these conditions. "We will have a couple of tricks up our sleeve tomorrow and hopefully they work for us. We have given a lot of thought to them." Spinner Nathan Lyon is likely to replace Pattinson, with Peter Forrest tipped to take Clarke's place.