An Oddsworth Opinion
How much of Marnus Labuschagne's hold on No. 3 rests on the last two years?
The talk before Durban is that Marnus Labuschagne's place at No. 3 is safe for the first Test against South Africa next week. That is a generous reading of a batter who has averaged 24.64 in men's Tests over the last two years, when top-seven batters as a group have averaged 33.36.
Those two years cover 15 Tests and 27 innings, and he has not made a hundred in any of them. His best score in that time is 72. This is the same player whose career average is still 43.8, with 11 hundreds from 65 Tests, and that career is what the selectors appear to be picking.
A long run of starts
Against England in November and December 2025 he made an unbeaten 51 in the first Test and 65 in the second, then scores of 19, 13, 6 and 8 across the next two. He has five half-centuries in the two years and none of them became a hundred. Against Bangladesh in August he fell cheaply in the first innings of both Tests, the first of which Australia lost by nine wickets.
South Africa's bowlers have seen this version of him already. When he faced them in June 2025 he ground through both innings, and his higher score was 22 from 64 balls. Getting stuck has become a habit, with a strike rate over the two years of 48.7, against 58 for top-seven batters.
Career average 43.8Not out
What our ratings still see
Our ratings are kinder than the recent scorecards. They place Labuschagne 24th among the 50 men's Test batters we rank, worth about 8 runs a match more than an average player. That is the weight of his earlier career holding him up, and it puts him in the middle of the list, a long way from the standing a No. 3 for the top side would expect.
A place on credit
Australia can carry him for now. Our ratings make them the best men's Test side, with a 75% chance of beating an average one. The defeat to Bangladesh showed how quickly that cover can disappear.
Picking him in Durban is defensible on his career and on a rating that still has him above average. It should also be the last selection made on that basis. If the series passes without the kind of hundred he has gone two years without, Australia need a new No. 3.