Haddin to step up for Clarke

Brad Haddin is to be anointed as Australia's short-term Test captain to cover for Michael Clarke, who may be compelled to sacrifice his availability for the entire India series in order to help the national team's medical staff find a solution to hamstring problems ahead of next year's World Cup and Ashes campaigns.

The team performance manager Pat Howard was frank in his view that the India Tests may be too soon given Clarke's recent history, and will recommend Haddin's endorsement by the Cricket Australia board in that event. An AC joint injury suffered in the UAE kept Haddin out of the ODI series against South Africa but he is set to play for New South Wales in the next Sheffield Shield round.

"This is a board matter but I will be applying to the board for Brad Haddin to be the captain of Australia. Nice and simple," Howard told The Age. "Brad has been very good in this process of supporting his captain so we're not looking for a succession planning captain at this time. We are looking for a person that is ready to go now. We've got a lot of other people who in the future might put their hands up but we've got a very clear framework of what we're going with."

Howard also stated that Clarke might even need to undergo surgery, after scans of his most recent hamstring ailment - the third in six weeks - returned inconclusive results. "We are putting the World Cup and Ashes right up there and if he's right for the Indian Test series so be it," he said. "But we've seen him rushed back and what we'd hate is for him to play a Test or two and then break down.

"Everything is on the table at this point. We saw Nathan Coulter-Nile go through hamstring surgery and come back in eight weeks, so obviously that is one possibility, yes. But we are actually going through having a look at all processes at the moment, and making sure we get player buy-in. It's important that Michael as the patient believes he is assessing all possible options.

"I have talked about the priorities and what they are. Sometimes you have got to take a little bit of a long term and a medium term picture. If we do this well, we can get extra years out of Michael who is a world class player, rather than thinking in days and tournaments. We have an opportunity to really get the best out of the last couple of years of his career."

Clarke's repeated hamstring trouble is related to his degenerative back condition and seems also to be linked to the effects of long haul travel. After electing to play despite a hamstring strain in Zimbabwe, which was then aggravated enough to rule him out of the limited overs matches in the UAE, Clarke looked ginger at times during the Pakistan Tests. He will now have to wait on the advice of the team physio Alex Kountouris and doctor Peter Brukner before progressing further.

"Getting to the World Cup is important and how we get through this progress and rehab program will be important first," Howard said. "Anything past that we will assess how his body has come through that period and it will be a consultative process. 'Mate, what can your body handle?' If it can handle everything and we've done it really well, keep going, if it can't we assess that at that time.

"Players react differently to different things. We follow best practice. I'm very happy with that and we are searching even further and wider now to look at different ways to challenge our thinking. That's why it's going to take a little bit of time to make sure the rehab program is [right]. We probably find something a little bit different and give it a go."