Cricket news 2025: Australia v West Indies second Test

Mark Taylor has urged Test rookie Sam Konstas to "clear his mind" and "make a decision" on how he wants to play the longest form of the game after the 19-year-old produced another two failures in the West Indies.

But the former Australian Test captain says the meagre output of Konstas' opening partner, 38-year-old Usman Khawaja, "is a bit more of a worry" than the teenager's struggles.

In Grenada on Monday (AEST), Australia completed a 133-run win to take an unassailable 2-0 series lead and retain the Frank Worrell Trophy.

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But the touring side did so with little help from Konstas and Khawaja, which has cast more concern over the top order only four months out from the first Test of the Ashes.

Konstas' scores of 3 and 5 in the first Test were followed by returns of 25 and 0 in the second, while Khawaja has strung together scores of 47, 15, 16 and 2 in the West Indies.

In Australia's second dig in Grenada, Konstas flashed at a wide Jayden Seales delivery and chopped on for a fourth-ball duck. He trudged off with his shoulders slumped and head bowed, visibly distraught.

"You can offer your support ... but that's where cricket's a tough game," Taylor told Wide World of Sports on Monday.

"At the end of the day, it's very much an individual game when you're there facing the bowler.

"I think all Sam needs to do is clear his mind and make a decision on how he wants to play.

"I think he tried to do that in the last Test match. He played some nice shots in the first innings, and in the second he obviously wanted to get away because he felt the best way to play at the moment is to look to be positive, and that's fine.

"So if that's what he wants to do, I would be sticking with it. Keep a nice, simple, clear mind and back yourself; that's all you can do in the game. And you hope things go your way."

Sam Konstas after chopping on for a duck in Grenada. AP

Konstas is trying to become a mainstay of the Australian Test side after winning back his spot in the Caribbean.

The Sydney product played an array of stunning strokes in a knock of 60 from 65 on the first morning of the Boxing Day Test, and did so against magnificent Indian quick Jasprit Bumrah, but subsequent underwhelming returns resulted in him being dropped after the series.

Many astute judges, Taylor included, wanted Konstas to show upon his return that he was capable of batting with patience and a classical technique in Test cricket.

And although the teenager has reeled in his exuberance, he hasn't looked comfortable at the crease.

"I think at the moment he's just a young guy trying to work out how he's going to play Test cricket," Taylor said.

"He obviously started with a bang with that sort of improvised innings at the MCG [against India on Boxing Day], and now he knows, I think we all know, he's not going make it playing like that all the time. It's something you can use at various times, but it's not a way you're going to be able to forge a 100-Test match career.

"So he's trying to find some runs in a more orthodox way to go with the flare, and that led to his dismissal in the second innings — a wide ball, threw his hands at it, not a lot of foot movement, and chopped it back on his stumps. That's what happens when you're searching for that right mode to play."

Mark Taylor commentating for Nine. Getty

Khawaja hasn't managed to consistently score runs of substance since midway through the 2023 Ashes tour of the UK.

Since the second match of that series, the left-hander has played 20 Tests for a return of only 1208 runs at 33.55.

He's also only made one century in that time, although that was a knock of 232 in Sri Lanka, the highest score of his 83-Test career.

"Usman, I think, is a bit more of a worry [than Konstas], because it's been probably 18 months now that he's — take out the score in Sri Lanka where he made 230 — really been struggling for runs at the top of the order," Taylor said.

"He's always been an elegant-looking player without a lot of foot movement; [he] generally just plays back and across.

"And at the moment — pitches have certainly played a part in this — he's getting caught on the crease a lot. That brings in the lbws, and he's edging a lot more balls because the feet aren't moving as well as they used to. And that's probably down to a bit of confidence, but also some of the surfaces that Australia have had in recent times to play on."

Usman Khawaja plods off. AP

Taylor believes selectors should persist with the Konstas-Khawaja opening partnership for the third Test, taking place in Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, from Sunday (AEST).

"I certainly would not change the top order. I would give Khawaja and Konstas another Test match to try and forge a combination, and by that I mean hopefully one, if not both, make big runs, at least a couple of nice partnerships or a nice partnership somewhere. And I'm sure that's exactly what they're hoping for, as well," Taylor said.

"I believe in that opening partnership. I was an opener myself. It's not always about making huge amounts of runs, but it's just forging that relationship where you seem to work off each other. I'd be giving them another opportunity.

"Now, if it doesn't work [in the third Test], that's when I'm starting to look around."

Konstas forced his way into the Test side last summer with scintillating form in the Sheffield Shield, even peeling off two centuries in a single match for NSW.

Similarly, Taylor hopes more young batters stake their Test selection claims in the early rounds of the upcoming Sheffield Shield season.

"If I was a selector I'd be using the early Shield rounds as an opportunity to see who else is out there at the moment," he said.

"That's probably the greater concern for Australian cricket; there's not a lot of top-order players belting the door down at the moment.

"It's easy to say, 'Oh, yes, we've got to move him on and him on', but the hardest bit is to find someone to replace those people."

Taylor believes there may still be life in Marnus Labuschagne's Test career.

"I would not have a line through Marnus Labuschagne at all," he said.

"At the moment, this side we've got is the side I would have pencilled in for the first Test of the summer," Taylor added.

"But I'd like to see Sam and Usman make some runs in the next Test, and I'd obviously like to see Cameron Green kick on and anyone make a hundred."

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