Labuschagne Retained for South Africa Tests as Australia Returns to Sandpapergate Ground
Australia have kept faith with Marnus Labuschagne for their three-Test tour of South Africa, naming the struggling batter in a 16-man squad despite a barren run that has now stretched nearly three years without a century.
The squad, announced on 7 September 2026, is otherwise largely unchanged from the most recent Test against Bangladesh, where Labuschagne managed scores of 1, 31 and 4 across two matches — dismissed for 4 in the second innings at Mackay, bowled by Shoriful Islam (Cricket Australia). That sequence saw him dropped from the one-day international squads for series in Zimbabwe and South Africa, but the Test door remains open.
George Bailey, Australia's chief selector, acknowledged the concern without closing it. "We would like more runs from Marnus," Bailey said, but added that selectors remain confident he can still make a positive contribution. He declined to label the South Africa series Labuschagne's last chance, calling the question hypothetical (BBC Sport).
The tour carries a weight that goes beyond one player's form. It is Australia's first Test series in South Africa since the 2018 ball-tampering scandal — the episode known as Sandpapergate, when Cameron Bancroft was caught using sandpaper to alter the ball's condition on the field in Cape Town. The fallout was seismic: Steve Smith and David Warner received year-long bans, Bancroft nine months, and the reputation of Australian cricket took a hit that has shaped the team's public image ever since.
Only six players from that 2018 series defeat remain in the current squad: captain Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood, Nathan Lyon, Steve Smith and Matt Renshaw (BBC Sport).
For Labuschagne, the tour is personal. Born in South Africa and now 32, he received Australia Test cap number 455 on the 2018 tour of the UAE — the United Arab Emirates, where Australia played Pakistan — scoring 0 and 13 on debut. He returns to the country of his birth carrying not just a form slump but a small technical tweak: he will trial a reconfigured thigh pad in South Africa, a change prompted by his dismissal in the Mackay Test (Cricket Australia).
The top order is Australia's pressing puzzle. Bailey said all options are on the table for who bats at number three — the first-drop position that traditionally faces the newest ball and is considered the most demanding after the openers. Cooper Connolly, included in the squad alongside fellow additions Matthew Kuhnemann and Michael Neser, looms as a key figure in how that lineup takes shape.
The series begins in Durban on 9 October, then moves to Gqeberha and Cape Town. Three grounds, three Tests, and a subcontinent winter behind them. For Labuschagne, a century anywhere along the way would be his first since 2023 — and would quieten a conversation that is growing louder by the innings.
