In terms of the captaincy, Smith is a more than able replacement.
The 36-year-old is himself an Ashes-winning skipper and only lost the captaincy in 2018 because of the ‘sandpapergate’ ball-tampering scandal.
The batter, one of the all-time great Ashes run-scorers, has stood in for Cummins as captain on six previous occasions.
Cummins’ place in the bowling attack is likely to go to Scott Boland, who has a peerless average of 12.63 in Test in Australia.
Boland, 36, is likely to join Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood, both also in their mid-30s, in a seam attack for a gruelling five-Test series crammed into just over seven weeks.
“Losing your captain is not ideal, but when you’re talking about Scott Boland as a potential replacement, it’s not a bad position to be in,” McDonald said.
With or without Cummins, Australia are likely to have to call on some inexperienced or untried reserves like Michael Neser, Brendan Doggett, or Fergus O’Neill, although McDonald has not ruled out a Test return for Mitchell Marsh.
Australia’s white-ball captain, who earned the most recent of his 46 caps last December, averages 28.5 with the bat and 40.4 with the ball in Tests.
“We would be comfortable picking someone, and if you want to put a name to it Mitch Marsh, out of white-ball cricket, if we felt like that was going to benefit the Test team,” said McDonald.
“We feel he’s batting as well as he has for a long period of time. We still haven’t given up on Mitch Marsh’s Test career.”
