Ian Healy says Australia is ‘lucky’ to have Tim Paine

TIM Paine may be winless from his six matches in charge of Australia, but former Test wicketkeeper Ian Healy believes the team is “lucky” to have him.Healy told foxsports.com.au Australia is suffering from an alarming dearth of cricketing experience and had no option but to hand the captaincy to Paine, who was struggling for state selection before last year.But the 119-Test player-turned-commentator conceded the 33-year-old would not have been his first choice if there were other experienced players to turn to following Steve Smith’s suspension for ball-tampering.“It’s a bit of a sore point that there are no other candidates, you know? What are we developing,
where are our cricketers?” Healy said after joining Fox Cricket’s commentary team.“I would have liked to have had ready one or two more experienced cricketers than Tim Paine having to take on the captaincy.”He added: “No one’s been guilty of making a mistake here, it’s just the way it panned out … it had to be lumped onto Painey. We’re lucky to have Painey as an experienced cricketer in the mix.”Healy sympathised with Paine, who was handed the unenviable task of leading the side in the wake of the Cape Town cheating scandal.He took control of the side in March for the fourth and final Test of the South Africa series. Australia suffered a crushing 492-run defeat.