“Summer of Starc”: The lethal leftie enjoying a career-best patch of form

Mitchell Starc is enjoying a purple patch of form for Australia with the ball.

The left-hander leads Australia for wickets this series so far with 13 to his name, two ahead of Pat Cummins on 11 and seven ahead of Josh Hazlewood - who missed the Adelaide Test - on six.

Starc is also striking at a better rate than the rest of the Aussie attack and is averaging an impressive 19.84 with the ball even though he went for 1/111 in the second innings in Perth.

Across his Test career, Starc has averaged 20 or fewer with the ball once during a home summer, coming in 2019/20 when he took a wicket every 17.44 runs across five matches against Pakistan and New Zealand.

Given that he’s now dominating against an imperious Indian line-up, SEN Cricket’s Tom Morris pondered whether we could be enjoying the ‘Summer of Starc’ after he removed both Yashasvi Jaiswal (4) and Shubman Gill (1) early in India’s first innings at the Gabba on Monday.

“The summer of Starc has a bit of a ring to it at the moment,” Morris told SEN The New Ball.

“We know in Perth, his figures in the second innings were poor 1/111, but he took 2/14 in the first innings and bowled really well in a shorter spell.

“But he really turned it on in the pink ball Test and yesterday again.

“He's such a lethal new ball bowler and the stat that we mentioned yesterday, only Dale Steyn has taken more wickets at a better strike rate in the first 10 overs of innings than Mitchell Starc in Test history. 

“He's at the very top of the tree.”

Starc’s impressive form has made some including SEN Cricket’s Adam Collins ponder whether he’s under-appreciated by Australian fans.

Morris feels the same way and he thinks it could be down to the type of bowler the left-hander is, even though he complements this Australian side perfectly.

“In Australia we like our fast bowlers to be metronomes, we like them to focus on line and length, hit the spot, bowl bumpers and give nothing away,” Morris said.

“The reality is when Starc's not his best, he does give some runs away, but he's a wicket-taker as well. 

“So you sort of take the good with the bat and he compliments the other two quicks perfectly in this bowling attack.”

Starc will hope to continue taking wickets when Australia enter the field with India 4/51 on Tuesday morning. Listen to every ball LIVE on SEN and the SEN app.