Australian all-rounder Michael Clarke, with a bowling average of 2.16 and strike rate of a wicket every 7.3 deliveries from five Tests, said on Thursday that Darren Lehmann will likely be Australia's top part-time spinner for the second cricket Test against New Zealand starting on Friday.
Since claiming six for nine on a deteriorating Mumbai pitch in India earlier this month, Clarke has bowled just once — for his Sydney club Western Suburbs Sutherland when he went wicketless.
"Darren's proven, he's taken a lot great wickets for Australia, so I think they will throw Darren the ball before they do me," Clarke said on Thursday when asked whether captain Ricky Ponting would call on his left-arm finger spinners in Adelaide.
Clarke begins his sixth Test with a batting average of 67.62. Lehmann, with 13 wickets at an average of 25.15 in 23 Tests, wants to improve on his home Adelaide ground — at the crease.
The burly left-hander's only previous Adelaide Test was a wasted opportunity — caught at slip for five runs off brother-in-law, English all-rounder Craig White, in 2002-03.