Nic Maddinson’s return to Test cricket ended in disappointment as the Australia opener fell for a 33-ball duck against South Africa at Kingsmead, Durban.
Nic Maddinson registers third-longest duck for an opener in men's Tests
Australia returned to South Africa for the first time since the Sandpaper gate but not to an ideal start. Nic Maddinson, whose last Test was against Pakistan in December 2016, was sent in to open but he struggled to get off the mark against the Proteas new-ball pair of Marco Jansen and Wiaan Mulder.
Desperate to open his account, Maddinson tried to cut Jansen in the 11th over off a good length delivery, only to chop it on to the stumps, ending his return from a decade-long exile in misery. Maddinson's duck was the third longest for openers in men's Test history, with only Trevor Gripper (36 balls) and Darrin Murray (39 balls) facing more deliveries without scoring a run.
This further highlighted Australia's batting woes. The pair of Travis Head and Maddinson was the seventh different opening combination they tried since the start of 2025, excluding Scott Boland opening in the Melbourne Test of the 2025-26 Ashes. They had also partnered Head with Jake Weatherald and Matt Renshaw in their previous series against Bangladesh in August, but found little sucess.
Since Usman Khawaja’s retirement, Australia have tried four different openers apart from Head and Boland. Weatherald had the longest run of six games, in which he could manage only 219 runs at an average of 21.9. Renshaw, Labuschagne, and Maddinson have opened once each.
To add to the opening conundrum, they are struggling to find stability at number three as well with Labuschagne’s poor form. Since the start of 2025, he has scored 429 runs from 12 Tests at an abysmal average of 22.57, crossing the fifty-run mark only twice.
Also read: Australia's next-gen Test XI: Head and Green stay, but who will replace the old guard?
Maddinson, whose last first-class appearance was almost 18 months ago in March 2025 and recovered from testicular cancer in this period, was called up to the Test side after Josh Inglis was ruled out of the series opener with a finger injury. Australia chief selector George Bailey explained the decision was taken with flexibility in mind as Maddinson can bat anywhere in the line-up.
"For the time and place that we are in right now, the conditions we're about to face, and the moving parts that we've had, he's just deemed the best fit," said Bailey. "I don't think there's a long list of players that provide that flexibility who can genuinely say that they can do both of those roles."
The decision, however, did not go down well with former Australia opener Matthew Hayden, who criticised the call. "Where we are at is that we are promoting the greatest pile of mediocrity that we’ve seen in a generation of cricket," Hayden said on the All Over Bar The Cricket podcast.
As for the ongoing contest, Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne had steadied the ship with a 60-run stand before both were dismissed either side of the lunch break. At the time of the writing, Australia were 125 for six with Renshaw and Pat Cummins at the crease.
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