JACKSON BARRETT: Usman Khawaja’s double century against Sri Lanka shows whe he should go on 2027 India tour

Usman Khawaja is at risk of having top-order players go past him by the time Australia pick a team for next summer’s Ashes, but his master class playing spin in Sri Lanka could go a long way to booking his seat on the plane to India in 2027.

He proved as he swept his way to a first-innings double century in Sri Lanka on Thursday that he is still among the country’s best players of spin.

Khawaja is 38 and will be 39 after the first Test of the Ashes so his days of playing more Tests at home appear numbered.

For Australia’s tour of India in 2027 — the final frontier for his cricketing generation — Khawaja will be 40.

It’s a long bridge, but the classy left-hander is a man that missed out on a decent chunk of his long Test career.

There were almost four years between his first Test and his 10th and he spent another two-and-a-half years out of the side after he was dropped three games into the 2019 Ashes series.

Australia have taken a horses-for-course approach to picking a side for this Test match, which was their reasoning for going without two-Test sensation Sam Konstas, shifting Travis Head to the top of the order and picking Josh Inglis — one of the country’s best players of spin — for his debut.

These are the players they feel are best equipped to win a Test match in the sub-continent. There are no more Tests in southern Asia scheduled under the future tours program before they play India.

It means there is a good chance Konstas and Nathan McSweeney haven’t played in that part of the world by then.

Sri Lanka’s most dangerous bowler while Khawaja was at the crease was leg-spinner Jeffrey Vandersay and the opener’s reverse-sweep was an effective way of countering him. He played large parts of his innings on Wednesday as a right-hander.

He survived a scare when he was dropped at first slip on 54 and later edged a ball sloppy Sri Lanka didn’t review. But he did the work and cashed in.

The Pakistani-born Khawaja has now conquered southern Asia, with Test tons in his home country, India, Dubai and Sri Lanka. At 38, he is also the oldest Australian batter to make a Test hundred since Steve Waugh in 2003.

Only Allan Border — our second-leading run-scorer of all-time — has posted more centuries in Asia than Khawaja.

It is his first century since the 2023 Ashes series and comes after Indian destroyer Jasprit Bumrah had a stranglehold over him during the home summer.

Asitha Fernando’s short-and-wide junk is nothing like facing Bumrah, but Sri Lanka’s spinners posed a challenge on a skiddy wicket already taking some turn.

If the next three innings go right for the veteran — who this week said he had no retirement plans — he might have made his case for the 2027 tour.

He was the leading run-scorer for the whole series the last time Australia travelled to India.

Maybe there was some future planning in mind by sticking with the veteran opener after he had endured a lean summer at home against India.