Doggett's Test debut represents a 150-year first for cricket – abc.net.au

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Sport
By Jon Healy
Topic:Ashes
Scott Boland and Brendan Doggett will team up today and create history as the first two Indigenous men to play in the same Test team. (Getty Images: Paul Kane)
Not even a year after his first-class debut, Brendan Doggett was named in a Test squad for the first time.
While he didn't play in that 2018 series against Pakistan, it was the sort of recognition that suggested he was next on deck.
But the seamer stranglehold of Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood allowed only brief interludes for just three quicks to make their Test debuts in the intervening seven years.
Meanwhile, Doggett turned from a hopeful 24-year-old Queenslander to a grizzled 31-year-old South Australian.
Seven years after first being named in a Test squad, Doggett makes his debut. (Getty Images)
He is the first Aussie quick to join the men's Test ranks since Scott Boland's iconic six-wicket haul in the 2021 Boxing Day Ashes Test and now the pair are set to make history together.
If the four years since that spell feel like a lifetime ago, it's nothing compared to the 157 years since multiple Indigenous men represented the country at something resembling Test level.
The first ever Australian sports team to tour internationally, the 1868 Aboriginal XI, has its history tucked away in western Victoria.
It's never happened in the official history of Test cricket, but from everything that's been written about the Aboriginal XI's 1868 tour of England, the standard displayed by the first Australian touring team was on par with anything else being offered at the time.
More than a century-and-a-half later, Doggett joins Boland in a somewhat surprisingly exclusive group of Indigenous Test players for Australia.
Aunty Faith Thomas and Ash Gardner have represented the women's team, while Doggett and Boland follow in the footsteps of ABC Sport's Jason Gillespie.
"I don't think there's necessarily a weight of expectation on these guys' shoulders," Gillespie said.
"They just want to go out there and show their pride and passion of repping Australia and that'll shine through. For me, that's the most important thing."
Brendan Doggett represented the Australian Indigenous Mens cricket team on a tour of England in 2018. (Getty Images: Darrian Traynor/Cricket Australia)
The 71-Test veteran, who will provide expert commentary as a member of ABC Sport's radio commentary team for the Ashes, had a different journey with his Indigenous heritage compared to the newest members of the club.
"They discovered their heritage in their 20s," Gillespie said.
"I knew since I could walk and talk that I've got indigenous heritage, it's just always been part of who I am."
Boland was already in his mid-20s when he found out that his grandfather was a Gulidjan man, from the Colac region of Victoria, and Doggett was similarly an adult when he learned of his mother's Worimi heritage.
And while they are part of a small list of Aboriginal Test cricketers, the work is being done to make it less of an anomaly.
Gillespie acknowledged that, compared to the football codes, cricket is a tougher sell for kids, with more time spent sitting around not batting or bowling; parents, with infinitely more kit required than other sports; and organisers, with bespoke facilities required rather than simply "an open space and a footy".
GIllespie said the faster-paced T20 game, which has made international stars out of Wiradjuri man Dan Christian and Migunberri man D'Arcy Short, could be a good way to capture the attention of Aboriginal kids looking for a sporting outlet.
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Elsewhere, everything from kit designs to the National Indigenous Cricket Championships to the Aboriginal XI's tour of England shows Cricket Australia's desire for a more inclusive future and recognition of the contributions of the past.
Both Doggett and Boland featured in that 2018 team to commemorate 150 years since Australia's first touring team was populated wholly by First Nations men, and have since earned their Test call-ups through years of toil in the domestic scene.
That was highlighted best by Doggett's 11-wicket haul in a player-of-the-match in last year's Sheffield Shield final.
"Confidence comes from evidence. The evidence is there, he's played 50 first-class games now, he's taken a lot of wickets, he's got recent form, he's been on a few tours," Gillespie said.
"The evidence is that he's got performances [on the big stage] and he'll derive a lot of confidence out of that.
"I'm confident he can play a role for Australia."
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