Warner given mini-break before New Zealand clash

David Warner, Australia’s stand-in captain for the triangular Twenty20 International series, will be given a mini-breather before Australia’s next encounter against New Zealand on 16 February.

"We're going to let him [Warner] go home after the Allan Border Medal ceremony for a couple of days and just arrive the day before the game," said Darren Lehmann, the Australia coach. “Give him a couple days at home, really. It's always a challenge when you've got the schedule as it is, but David's really keen to play as captain, so we'll give him a couple days off and get him to New Zealand just before the game and he can play."

Warner has impressed with his aggressive brand of captaincy, with Australia so far winning all their three matches convincingly to seal a spot in the final. However, Warner’s own performances with the bat have left a lot to be desired, with scores of 6, 4 and 2 so far. He also had a forgettable One-Day International series against England before that as he averaged a lowly 14.60 with just 73 runs in five matches.

Lehmann, however, was unperturbed by Warner’s form. “You can only do so much work,” he said. “He's been working so hard, it's almost like ‘give him a couple days away from the game’. Ricky Ponting has been doing some really good work with him, so we expect him to come out of that rut pretty quickly.”

Lehmann also spoke highly of Warner’s leadership skills, and said: “You've got your leaders in Steven [Smith] and David and you need one of them to captain, so that's the reason behind it from the selection panel, making sure we've got constant messaging through our leaders and David's been great in this series. Steven's had his break, David will get a little mini-break, and Steven's got to do the tour game while we're playing the [T20I] final.”