Does Jack Clayton's Shield record earn him a Test debut?

The slogan that once helped Matt Hayden into the Test side has a successor in Queensland. Since Jack Clayton made his seventh Sheffield Shield century, the call to give Jack a crack has only grown louder. Our ratings strike a quieter note by placing Clayton 35th of the 72 batters they rank in the Shield, worth about 3 runs a match less than an average batter in the competition.

Clayton is a left-handed top-order batter who also bowls left-arm wrist-spin, and his hundreds show he can turn a start into a big score at first-class level. Our ratings judge him on the whole of his Shield batting, though, and on that measure the big days have not yet lifted him above the middle of the table.

Where does Clayton rank among Shield batters?

A batter pushing for a Test debut should stand near the top of the Shield table, because the Shield is the competition selectors lean on most for a red-ball call, and Clayton sits almost exactly halfway down it.

That puts him among the batters who hold their own in the Shield without standing clear of it. Picking him now would mean choosing him ahead of every batter our ratings place higher in the same competition, and the selectors would struggle to explain that on his Shield numbers alone. For the panel, that makes Clayton a batter to keep watching this summer, with no claim yet to be picked over the batters above him.

Should Jack Clayton get a Test debut now?

The mood around him says yes, with Test squad rumours swirling this week and Clayton speaking about being backed by Uzzie, but his record says not yet. Backing like that tells you how a batter looks when he is in form. It tells you very little about how he measures up across a whole Shield record, and on that record the slogan has run ahead of the runs.

The rest of this Shield summer will settle it. If Clayton turns his red-hot start into a steady run of scores, his rating will climb out of the middle of the table and the case will make itself. Until then, the selectors should leave the chant to the crowd and let Clayton keep piling up hundreds in Queensland colours.