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Australian wicket keeper batsman Adam [tag]Gilchrist[/tag] has recommended that Australia should rest its key players for the [tag]Champions Trophy[/tag] so that they are fresh and ready to take on [tag]England[/tag] in a bid to regain the [tag]Ashes[/tag] later this year. Australia who lost in England 2-1 last year will be hosting Ashes later this year.

“We have to get our priorities right there, Gilchrist quoted. It is important that selectors, administrators, players and whoever else needs to be involved sits down and nuts that out. I am not saying no-one goes, or all key players [don't go to the Champions Trophy] … I don’t know. But we have to sit down and address it, definitely. I think we have to look very, very seriously at that lead into the Ashes.

“There is the Champions Trophy, and I believe there are potentially other games of one-day cricket that may come up before that. We are going to have to be very careful about what we want to prioritise as most important.”

Even though Gilchrist made his views clear,but he didn’t find much support from Cricket Australia – Michael Brown, their operations manager, ruled out a “mass rest”, instead stating that the best team will be selected. “We are worried about the whole seven months of cricket. The ICC Champions Trophy is clearly important to Cricket Australia. We’ll be sending a very, very good team, the best team available at the time,” Brown said. “For us, the ICC tournaments are of number one importance. We have never won a Champions Trophy and would like to win it. I can’t stress this enough about the Champions Trophy: we’ll be going with a team that we intend to win it [with].

“Part of our strategic plan is to lead the world in cricket performance, so to entertain the thought that we’re going to be mass resting players is not going to happen. What we will do is individually manage every player’s workload over the period because let’s not forget that some players over the next 12 months play very little cricket.”

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